Business confidence in the country during the ongoing quarter has improved on account of government measures, macroeconomic boost and festive season demand, among others, says a survey.
The Dun & Bradstreet Composite Business Optimism Index (BOI) stood at 76.7 during October-December of 2017, an increase of 6.4 per cent from the preceding three months.
The index, however, fell 4.1 per cent against the corresponding three months a year ago.
"The index has improved during Q4 2017 as compared to previous quarter. It appears that the initiatives taken by the government, and improvement in some macroeconomic indicators have allayed some concerns of economic slowdown," Dun & Bradstreet Managing Director (India) Manish Sinha said.
"Specific events that have helped optimism levels are government policies to help small enterprises and exporters on GST, the festive season demand and recent hike in pay scales to teachers and academic staff. The supply disruptions arising from GST rollout is also anticipated to reverse gradually as the companies adapt to the new system after enduring the initial glitches," he added.
Going forward, Sinha said that the reform agenda of the government should continue uninhibited.
"However, it is the pace of implementation of these initiatives that would continue to instill optimism amongst the companies as it would indicate that the government remains committed to reinforce the growth momentum of the economy," he added.
The index, measures the pulse of the business community and is arrived at on the basis of a quarterly survey of business expectations.
For calculating the composite BOI, each of the six parameters net sale, net profit, selling price, new order, inventory and employee level - is assigned a weight. The parameter weights are then applied to these ratios and the results aggregated to arrive at the Composite BOI.
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