Iowa Business Council: Economy slowed in Q3
BUSINESS RECORD STAFF Sep 1, 2015 | 8:14 pm
1 min read time
255 wordsAll Latest News, Economic DevelopmentIowa Business Council members expect a good Iowa economy in the next six months, but they aren’t as excited as they were the past few quarters.
“The reach of global economic concerns may finally be extending, to a degree, into our local industry segments,” said Mike Wells, president and CEO of Wells Enterprises in Le Mars and council chairman. “However, reasonable levels of optimism remain in sales, capital spending and employment to possibly sustain some measure of the fairly robust outcomes experienced by many Iowa companies so far this year.”
The third-quarter overall index stood at 59, down eight points from the previous quarter and six points behind the third quarter of 2014.
Here’s a breakdown of the other results from the survey taken in the last half of August and released today.
Sales: The third-quarter index of 57 was 12 points lower than last quarter and nine points less than the year-ago figure. Of the CEOs surveyed, 43 percent expect higher sales over the next six months.
Capital spending: The index of 59 was three points lower than the previous quarter and lagged last year’s figure by seven points. Fully one-third of the respondents expect higher capital spending, and another 5 percent predict substantially higher spending. More than half, 52 percent, expect no change.
Employment: At 61, the index was down eight from the previous quarter, and lagged last year by two points. Nearly half of respondents, 48 percent, expect to increase hiring in coming months, while 43 percent expect no change.Read more
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