New research shows virus stifling consumer, business optimism

While this is an improvement from the slim 1 percent who said economic conditions were good back in June, the survey results also show that the timeline for an expected return to normalcy has been pushed back.While the percentage of North American CFOs expecting better conditions in a year rose from 43 percent last quarter to 59 percent now, around one in four don’t expect improvement until the beginning of 2022 or later, primarily in hard-hit sectors like retail.“Medium to longer term, given the vaccine and given some other factors, prospects are improving, but they know the process is going to take a lot longer,” said Steve Gallucci, national leader of the U.S. CFO Program at Deloitte.“I think the optimism is really tied to clarity,” he said, pointing out that three months ago, the outcome of the presidential election was still unknown, and there was much less certainty about the timeline of a Covid-19 vaccine.Much of CFO’s forward-looking optimism, though, hinges on three events CFOs overwhelmingly support: more fiscal stimulus, a federal infrastructure spending package and a nationally coordinated Covid response — none of which is in place right now.“Clearly, we did see a strong consensus that CFOs would like to see a federally coordinated response to Covid-19,” Gallucci said.