The Business Survey Index (BSI) [Provided by the Korea Federation of SMEs. No resale or database use permitted]
(Seoul = Yonhap News) Reporter Kang Ae-ran = Small businesses anticipate that both the manufacturing and non-manufacturing sectors will worsen in January next year.
The Korea Federation of SMEs announced on the 26th that the results of the Business Survey Index (SBHI) conducted from the 11th to the 18th with 3,071 small businesses indicated that the SBHI for January next year fell by 4.5 points to 68.1 compared to this month.
If the SBHI is above 100, it means that more companies have a positive outlook on the economy than those that do not, and a reading below 100 means the opposite.
By sector, manufacturing dropped by 5.3 points to 74.0, and non-manufacturing fell by 4.2 points to 65.5.
Among non-manufacturing sectors, construction decreased by 5.4 points to 64.2, and services fell by 3.9 points to 65.8.
In the service sector, real estate rose by 1.3 points to 70.6, but nine industries, including transportation (69.2) and accommodation and food services (66.2), all decreased.
The major difficulties faced by small businesses this month (multiple responses) were sluggish sales at 46.0%, followed by rising labor costs (36.4%), increasing raw material prices (28.2%), and intensified competition among companies (24.3%).
The average operating rate of small manufacturers last month was 72.2%, up 0.3 percentage points from the previous month.