Posthaste: Lower interest rates and Trudeau departure key to Canadian CEOs' outlook, survey finds

financialpost.com:

Lower interest rates and the defeat of Justin Trudeau‘s Liberals: those are the conditions many Canadian CEOs are attaching to an improved business outlook for 2025, according to a new survey.

The inaugural poll by research and leadership company Chief Executive Group LLC said 42 per cent of the 300 Canadian C-suite leaders surveyed expect business conditions to improve 12 months from now as inflation continues to slow and the Bank of Canada carries on implementing interest rate cuts that have already brought rates down to 4.25 per cent from an almost two-decade high of five per cent.

Leaders currently rate business conditions at 5.9 on a scale of one to 10, where one is poor and 10 is excellent, according to the company’s Canadian CEO Confidence Index. Looking to next year, 42 per cent have upgraded their outlook for business conditions to 6.3, while 40 per cent said they expect business conditions to remain the same.

However, central to many leaders’ hopes for improved business conditions is an election to sweep out Trudeau and bring in a new government, one “that many said would hopefully go to a party that can better support businesses,” a company’s news release said.

An federal election in Canada is scheduled to be held by October 2025, at the latest. However, the end of the supply and confidence agreement between the LIberals and the New Democratic Party means one could come sooner.

Despite what many executives perceive as “challenging conditions” for business, 72 per cent said they expect revenue to rise over the next 12 months, while 63 per cent said they are also forecasting high profits.

“When it comes to hiring and deploying cash, however, those numbers drop,” the release said.

Just under half the executives