WELLINGTON – New Zealand’s business confidence in the second quarter continued to pick up from low levels but firms remain downbeat, a private think tank said on Tuesday.
A net 63 percent of firms surveyed expected general business conditions to deteriorate compared with 66 percent pessimism in the previous quarter, the New Zealand Institute of Economic Research’s quarterly survey of business opinion showed.On a seasonally adjusted basis, 59 percent expected business conditions to worsen, versus 63 percent pessimism recorded in the previous period. The survey’s measure of capacity utilization fell to 81.7 percent, from the previous quarter’s 94 percent.
NZIER said while demand continues to soften, the marked decline in capacity utilization amongst builders and manufacturers and the proportion of firms reporting difficulty in finding labor, especially unskilled labor, point to a considerable easing in capacity pressures in the New Zealand