Jan 6 (Reuters) – British company executives became a little more optimistic following finance minister Rachel Reeves’ budget and \u200bgrew more willing to increase investment, although the mood \u200coverall stayed muted, a survey showed on Tuesday.<\/p>\n
The quarterly net balance of business \u200coptimism from accountants Deloitte improved to -13% in the fourth quarter of 2025 from -24% in the third quarter, while remaining below average.<\/p>\n
“Business sentiment is subdued but more positive than a year ago,” Deloitte \u2060chief economist Ian Stewart.<\/p>\n
Reeves \u200cannounced 26 billion pounds ($35 billion) of tax hikes in November but delayed most of them and \u200dthe increases were much less focused on businesses than in her first budget in 2024.<\/p>\n
The Deloitte survey of 55 chief financial officers at \u200bmajor companies was conducted between December 2 and December \u200c14.<\/p>\n
Preliminary figures from last month’s S&P Global Purchasing Managers’ Index – another closely watched set of surveys – also painted a picture of tentative improvements in morale across British boardrooms.<\/p>\n
“While CFOs remain cautious about geopolitics and productivity, business confidence and risk appetite have ticked up \u2060from their autumn lows and perceptions of external \u200buncertainty have edged lower,” Deloitte’s Stewart \u200bsaid.<\/p>\n
The proportion of executives who see raising capital expenditure as a strong priority rose to a two-and-a-half-year \u200dhigh of 17%.<\/p>\n
A \u2060final version of December’s PMI for the services sector is due later on Tuesday. Last week, the manufacturing index \u2060pointed to a tepid upturn in late 2025 for a sector that \u200chas struggled for momentum in recent years.<\/p>\n
(Reporting by Andy \u200cBruce; editing by David Milliken)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Jan 6 (Reuters) – British company executives became a little more optimistic following finance minister Rachel Reeves’ budget…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":676986,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,4],"tags":[748,205681,205680,29697,393,71839,4884,1144,619,712,16,15,1764],"class_list":{"0":"post-676985","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-uk","8":"category-united-kingdom","9":"tag-britain","10":"tag-business-optimism","11":"tag-company-executives","12":"tag-deloitte","13":"tag-england","14":"tag-finance-minister","15":"tag-great-britain","16":"tag-northern-ireland","17":"tag-rachel-reeves","18":"tag-scotland","19":"tag-uk","20":"tag-united-kingdom","21":"tag-wales"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115846447475912383","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/676985","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=676985"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/676985\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/676986"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=676985"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=676985"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=676985"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}