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The BER takes the percentage of respondents that rates prevailing conditions as satisfactory as indicator or proxy of business confidence.
Detailed data on consumer confidence is provided, disaggregated by income, LSM and population groups as well as per province.
The Absa Purchasing Managers’ Index™ (PMI™) compiled by the Bureau for Economic Research (BER).
The index can vary between zero (indicating an extreme lack of confidence) and 100 (indicating extreme confidence).
The FNB/BER Civil Confidence Index reflects the state of business conditions in the civil engineering industry.
The seasonally adjusted Absa Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) decreased by 1.6 points to 43.1 in May 2025. The headline PMI remained in contractionary territory for a seventh consecutive month. This suggests that the manufacturing sector continued to suffer in May, despite some flickers of activity and demand improvement, albeit at extremely low levels.
Read MoreThe seasonally adjusted Absa Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) decreased by 4 points to 44.7 in April 2025. The headline PMI remained in contractionary territory for a sixth consecutive month. The respondents' commentary was decidedly more negative in April.
Read MoreThe seasonally adjusted Absa Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) increased by 4 points to 48.7 in March 2025. While the headline PMI remained in contractionary territory for a fifth consecutive month, this is the highest reading since the 52.6 points recorded in October. Despite some recovery in March, a weak January and February mean that the average for 2025Q1 is at 46.2 points, below 2024Q4’s 49 points.
Read MoreThe seasonally adjusted Absa Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) declined slightly by 0.6 points to 44.7 points in February 2025, remaining in contractionary terrain. This is the fourth consecutive contraction, as activity remains subdued. The manufacturing sector has seemingly not picked up following its poor performance towards the end of last year.
Read MoreThe seasonally adjusted Absa Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) started the year on the back foot, declining by 0.9 points to 45.3 points in January 2025. This suggests that the loss of momentum observed at the end of 2024 has not reversed at the start of the year. However, it was encouraging that activity and demand improved from low levels – albeit remaining in contractionary terrain.
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