Firms optimistic in Q4; outlook for next 6 months also brighter

Singapore

BUSINESS conditions improved and firms turned optimistic at the end of last year, according to The Business Times-Singapore University of Social Sciences (BT-SUSS) Business Climate Survey for the fourth quarter of 2017.

Sales and new orders improved to near-expansion levels, while profits contracted the least since Q1 2015.

And firms were, overall, optimistic about the next six months - for the first time since Q2 2014.

Regression analysis of the indicators predicts Singapore's Q1 growth to come in at 4.7 per cent to 5.3 per cent, although other economists have more modest predictions.

Conducted from Dec 12, 2017 till Jan 15, th…