Business confidence rebounds in Mass.
Confidence among Massachusetts businesses shot upward in July to its highest level since March amid an expanding national economy, Associated Industries of Massachusetts said Tuesday.
AIM said its Business Confidence Index registered a 59.2 last month on a scale of 1 to 100, with 50 being neutral. That was up from 56.3 in June. Over the last 12 months, the index peaked at 60.2 in March, having jumped from 59.8 in February. Last month’s reading was the third highest within the last year. (Click here to read about June's numbers.)
The July jump ended a string of three monthly declines in the index.
Raymond G. Torto, chair of AIM's Board of Economic Advisors and a lecturer at the Harvard Graduate School of Design, said the index’s recent performance extends a pattern that has prevailed for much of the post-Great Recession period. “Like the economy itself, the Index has followed a long-term trend of improvement,” he said in a statement. “But the upward course has been longer and bumpier than most past recoveries.”
The index’s sub-indices, based on selected questions or characteristics of respondents, all rose from June to July, and most were up from a year before.
The U.S. Index assessing national conditions gained 2.5 points to 50.1, and the index of conditions within Massachusetts rose six-tenths to 57.5.
“The domestic economy, after a weak first quarter, is experiencing solid expansion, and Massachusetts continues to perform well in the national context,” said board member Sara L. Johnson, senior research director of global economics at IHS Global Insight. But she added, “Growth in international trade … has been disappointing,” with improving conditions in Europe more than offset by a slowdown in Asia.
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