Most CEOs see recession coming by 2020
Not good news at all. But all bubbles burst at some point.
If this is a real possibility, perhaps the Fed should not be raising interest rates now.Considering that major corporations have been busy shedding workers, it follows that corporate finance leaders see a U.S. recession ahead. Evidence of a slowing economy has been popping up, including recent large-scale cuts in head count by U.S. corporations such as General Motors and Verizon.
Eighty-two percent of chief financial officers polled believe a recession will have started by the end 2020, and nearly 49 percent think the downturn will arrive sometime next year, according to the Duke University/CFO Global Business Outlook, released Wednesday.
"The end is near for the near-decade-long burst of global economic growth," said John Graham, a finance professor at Duke's Fuqua School of Business and director of the survey. "The U.S. outlook has declined, and moreover the outlook is even worse in many other parts of the world, which will lead to softer demand for U.S. goods."
Worst-case projections would see capital spending drop in 2019, accompanied by flat hiring, found the survey conducted Friday of more than 500 CFOs, including 226 from North America.