BRUSSELS: Belgium’s business confidence rose to its highest level in almost four years during June, as sentiment improved in manufacturing, business services and construction sectors, survey results from the National Bank of Belgium showed Wednesday.
The business confidence index rose to -3.9 from -4.9 in May. That defied economists’ expectations for a deterioration in the measure to -5. The latest score was the highest since July 2011.
Sentiment improved for a fifth consecutive month in both business-related services and manufacturing. The confidence index for the business-related services sharply rose to 13.1 from 9.4 with firms giving a very favorable view on the current level of activity. They also continue to expect an expansion of their activity and even more so for general market demand.
The measure for manufacturing morale climbed to -5 from -6.4, mainly due to a sharp upward revision of demand forecasts, which offset
