Small Business Finance News
Study Shows Small Businesses Kept Confident In December
Written by Jenna Weiner
Published: 12/28/2009
Discover's Small Business Watch for December revealed that SMB owners are gaining confidence in the economy.
Even while holiday sales were expected to be lackluster, the latest report from Discover's Small Business Watch showed that SMB economic confidence remained steady in December. In fact, it may be good news for small business owners that the confidence index increased slightly to 77.0 points, up from 76.5 points in November.
The report revealed that 25 percent of small business owners think the economy is getting better, and the proportion of SMB owners who think it is getting worse is down to 49 percent from 53 percent in November.
Moreover, SMB owners who have experienced cash flow issues for the month is down a percentage point to 51 percent, and 45 percent reported that their SMBs have not experienced cash flow issues for the month of December.
Ryan Scully, director of Discover's credit card says small businesses are entering the New Year "on a cautious note." Nonetheless, he believes the outlook is up. "[O]n a positive note, the number of them who see conditions for their own businesses getting better in the next six months increased for the first time since August."
The new year offers new opportunities to small businesses to increase their development activities; according to a Vertical Response survey, 74 percent of SMB owners plan to increase their email marketing to jumpstart revenue in 2010.
Share this article
About Our Small Business News
If this news for entrepreneurs inspired you, you can find plenty more like it on our site. We cover current news stories for entrepreneurs. In addition to breaking news for entrepreneurs, we also have tons of how-to articles that cover topics like writing a business plan, preparing a marketing plan, getting publicity and much more.
Additional Resources for Entrepreneurs