[OPE] Something's going up this Xmas, but it's not a lot of business incomes

McKinsey Global Executive Survey, December 2008:

With regard to their companies, nearly 70 percent of respondents say they have already seen their profits fall as a result of global turmoil, and half expect profits to fall in 2009. The share of executives saying their companies are planning to decrease the size of their workforces in the near term has risen from 35 percent to 44 percent in the past month. (...) executives in North America remain relatively less troubled about their countries' economies than those in other developed markets. Executives in the euro zone are least likely to say so, and those in China likeliest to have taken a hit. Notably, many companies were already weakened six months ago, according to responses to a similar question in June: in that survey, 57 percent of respondents said the US economic slowdown had already had a negative effect on their company. Nearly two-thirds of respondents to this survey say the main cause of their decreased profits is lower spending by consumers or other businesses. Interestingly, however, most companies did not try to encourage customer spending with price cuts: 55 percent say their companies have held prices steady since early September, and 18 percent have raised them. China is different; there, 40 percent of executives say their companies have lowered prices, though the data don't show whether that change is a response to lowered profits or a cause of it.

http://www.mckinseyquarterly.com/Economic_Studies/Productivity_Performance/Economic_conditions_snapshot_December_2008_McKinsey_Global_Survey_Results_2280

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Received on Tue Dec 23 16:55:12 2008