CFOs Express More Optimism

Financial executives at U.S. companies expressed more optimism that their businesses will hire employees and see revenue growth in 2011, according to a recent Bank of America Merrill Lynch survey.

Of the 801 executives surveyed in the bank’s annual CFO Outlook, 47% said they expect their companies to hire additional employees next year. This is up from 28% who forecast hiring last year. Only 6% said they expect layoffs, compared with 9% last year. In addition, 64% of CFOs expect revenue growth in 2011, up from 61% last year.

“Despite the challenging economic climate, many CFOs have growing confidence that their companies have weathered the worst of the storm and are poised for expansion,” said Laura Whitley. She is a Global Commercial Products executive at Bank of America Merrill Lynch. In addition, she oversees the delivery of debt, treasury and liquidity solutions. Doing such supervision to more than 140,000 commercial and institutional clients. “Although concerns about the economy remain, the increase in CFOs who expect to hire employees could be crucial to improving the nation’s unemployment rate.”

Financial executives gave the current economy a score of 47 out of 100. Such a score is up slightly from last year’s score of 44. Last years score was the lowest in the 13-year history of the annual CFO Outlook. Despite that improvement, CFOs weren’t as optimistic about U.S. economic growth. Only 56% said they expect expansion in 2011. This differs to the 66% of CFOs who forecast economic growth a year ago.

Other notable findings in the survey:

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