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SINGAPORE: Accountants all over the world are enjoying a surge of optimism over the global economic outlook as the year draws to a close.
46 per cent of over 1,700 accountants who responded to a recent survey said they believed economic conditions are about to improve or are already doing so. This was up from 34 per cent who believed so in August.
However, the survey by the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA) also found that the number of sceptics has grown. 11 per cent of the respondents now expect the downturn to last another three years or more.
ACCA said this is due to a number of global risk factors that do not appear to be receding. For example, investment - especially in human resources - is still falling.
Close to 40 per cent of the respondents said the economy they worked in was scaling down investment in staff, and over 30 per cent reported falling investment in capital projects.
40 per cent added that investment opportunities have dwindled in the past three months, and a third said that government support for investment has decreased.
The survey also found that accountants in the Asia Pacific were more optimistic about the economic outlook than their global counterparts. Almost half of the Asia Pacific respondents said they had revised their forecasts upwards in the last quarter of 2009, against 32 per cent globally.
In Singapore, the accountants said the government has done a good job in handling the recession, with 66 per cent saying that government interventions have been either "good" or "very good".
- CNA/sc
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