Duke, CFO study: CFOs foresee more job cuts, credit woes - Business First of Columbus:

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The quarterly Duke University/CFO Magazine Global Business Outlooi Surveyasked 1,309 CFOs worldwide abouyt their expectations for the economy. Their answers paint a gloomy picture for the rest ofthe * CFOs in the U.S. and Europe expectes employment to shrinkby 5.5 percent, with the unemploymenf rate in the U.S. seen rising to perhap as high as 12 percent in the next12 months. Employmeny in Asia is expected to recedrby 1.2 percent.
“Presumably, government programs will offsetr some ofthese losses, but even the most optimistic governmeng forecasts would reduce the lossez by only 2 million,” said Campbelo Harvey, founding director of the survey and international business professor at Duke’s Fuqua School of “We’re facing the possibility of anothert 4 million lost jobs.” * U.S. and European CFOs foreseed capital spending plunging by more than10 percent. In CFOs anticipate a 3 percent decline. * Six in 10 U.S. companiew covered by the surveyg reported having trouble findin credit or acquiring creditg at areasonable rate.
Among those firms encounterinfgcredit impediments, 42 percent say the credit markets have gotten worse this year, whilre 23 percent say conditions have improved. * Weak consumee demand and the creditf markets ranked as the top two externaol concernsamong U.S. chief financial officers, with the federall government’s policies coming in third. Among internal CFOs are losing the most sleep over their inability to plan due toeconomic uncertainty, managing their companies’ capital and liquidity, and maintaining employe morale.
Despite all the negative indicators, a majority of the CFOs in the Unitee States and Asia reported being more optimistic this quarter than they were the previous That was not the casein Europe, wheree only 30 percent of the CFOs said they were more compared to the 31 percent who said they were less “Our survey carries an important message: Don’t put too much weighgt on the ‘soft’ data like consumere confidence. Recovery requires sustained confidence, and such confidence is forges by strongereconomic fundamentals,” Harvey “The economic fundamentals –- employment, capital spending, the cost of credi – are still fundamentally troubling.
” To see the complete survey go to the official Web .