Businesses Optimistic Despite Ongoing Challenges

Businesses across Canada continue to face challenges, but most are optimistic in their future outlook, says Statistic Canada’s fourth quarter ‘Canadian Survey on Business Conditions.’ The report says businesses continue expecting to face a variety of obstacles over the next three months related to supply chains, rising inflation, rising cost of inputs, rising transportation costs, and hiring and retention. It says 29.8 per cent that are facing challenges maintaining inventory levels or acquiring inputs, products, and supplies, either domestically or abroad, expect these challenges to worsen in the short term. Over the next three months, almost half of businesses expect their operating expenses to increase, more than one-third expect their profitability to decrease, nearly one-third expect to increase the prices they charge, and four-fifths expect their number of employees to remain the same. Fewer businesses say they are experiencing supply chain challenges; however, more of them expect these challenges to continue for the longer term. As a result, 52.8 per cent of businesses expect profitability to remain relatively unchanged over the next three months. That said, future outlook remains relatively unchanged from the previous quarter, with 70.3 per cent of businesses reporting being either very optimistic or somewhat optimistic about their future outlook over the next 12 months.