KUALA LUMPUR, Nov. 26 (Xinhua) -- Malaysian businesses anticipate a promising business environment in the fourth quarter of 2024, with a positive confidence indicator of +4.8 percent, the highest since the second quarter of 2022, an official survey showed Tuesday.
Across all sectors surveyed, services, wholesale and retail trade as well as industry sectors remain optimistic about their future business condition, the Department of Statistics Malaysia (DOSM) said in a statement.
The confidence indicator for the services sector posts an improvement with +13.1 percent in the fourth quarter 2024 from +8.3 percent in the previous quarter.
Similarly, sentiment within the wholesale and retail trade sector continues to be positive in the fourth quarter with +5.5 percent as compared to +1.4 percent in the previous quarter.
The industry sector also expects a favorable business condition in the fourth quarter as the confidence indicator posts +1.2 percent.
Meanwhile, businesses in the construction sector turn pessimistic with a confidence indicator of -10.0 percent in the reference quarter as against +2.2 percent in the third quarter of 2024. ■