Consumers confidence in India waning: Neilsen
24 Jul 2013
India slipped to number 3 in the global consumer confidence ranking, yielding the first and second positions to Indonesia and the Philippines in the second quarter of the current year amidst rising prices, the weakening of the rupee and the overall sluggishness of the economy.
Indonesia has displaced India as the most optimistic nation for the first time in the quarter ended June 2012 while the Philippines also has gone ahead of India to the second place in terms of consumer confidence, according to the Nielsen Global Consumer Confidence Index released on Tuesday.
The Neilsen index of consumer confidence for India dropped to 118 from 119 in the same period a year ago.
At the same time, nations like the United States, China and Japan moved ahead in consumer confidence with more optimistic perceptions about jobs, personal finances and spending intentions, the survey shows.
Portugal retained its position as the most pessimistic consumer market in the survey while Hungary and Italy were in the second most downbeat markets.
Consumer confidence declined in 14 of 29 European markets as governments cut budgets, raised taxes and unemployment continued to remain high.
"The European consumer is in a holding pattern, and in fact, at Nielsen we see a distinct set of tiers with German consumers being the most confident, followed by consumers in the UK, France, and then Italy and Greece where confidence is both low and also falling," said Venkatesh Bala, chief economist at The Cambridge Group, a part of Nielsen.
The Nielsen Global Consumer Confidence Index rose 1 point in the second quarter to 94, after rising 2 points in the previous quarter. A reading below 100, however, signals consumers are pessimistic overall about the outlook.
Consumer morale improved in the United States, the world's biggest economy, reflecting increasing employment opportunities, higher home prices and a rising stock market, Bala said.
"When consumers feel richer and also more secure about getting a job or keeping their job, that naturally makes them more confident ... It's the reverse of what happened in 2008-2009 when job layoffs soared and house prices collapsed along with the bottoming of the stock market," Bala said.
In Japan, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's aggressive efforts to revive the economy helped revive consumer confidence.
Consumers in Latin America and in the Asia Pacific region remained most confident about the outlook for jobs and their personal finances over the next 12 months although confidence decreased in Latin America for a second consecutive quarter.
North Americans were most optimistic about immediate spending intentions. Consumer confidence in Pakistan, Greece and Colombia also saw big increases between the first and second quarters.
Confidence declined most sharply in Israel, Norway and Mexico.
The Nielsen survey, conducted between 13 and 31 May 2013, covered more than 29,000 online consumers across 58 markets.
