· Four out of five owner-managers believe their business will be better off or remain the same in the next 12 months, with over a third planning to recruit more staff.
· Optimism in the UK economy's outlook has dramatically leapt forward by 23% since February.
· Almost nine out of ten small businesses found the Iraq conflict brought little or no negative impact.
Bank of Scotland Business Banking's third quarterly UK-wide small business economic confidence survey has revealed that the country's owner-managers are singularly optimistic about the future of their business and the outlook of the economy.
More than four out of five (81%) of small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are optimistic about how their business will fare over the next 12 months. This represents a dramatic net improvement in business optimism of 37% since the Bank's February survey, perhaps suggesting perceptions of a downturn have been largely exorcised.
