Businesses downbeat on Brexit despite stockmarkets storming ahead

Deloitte survey finds 83% of CFOs expect worse long-term environment

Some 83% of chief financial officers (CFOs) surveyed by Deloitte are downbeat on the outlook for the long-term business environment as a consequence of Brexit.

The result marks the highest proportion of negative responses to the Deloitte CFO Survey since the EU referendum in June 2016.  At the same time, just 4% of CFOs think now is a good time to take greater risk onto their balance sheets, the lowest number since the 2008 crisis, and just 9% have a more optimistic outlook for their companies than three months ago, down from 13% in the previous quarter. Yet despite this corporate pessimism, investors appear to remain unperturbed, with the FTSE 100 storming ahead past the 7,600 mark. UK investors move £62bn into Luxembourg and Dublin fund...