ASEAN CEOs tag Singapore as the most important city for their business growth

The city-state rallied ahead of Kuala Lumpur, Jakarta, New York, and London.

If the latest PwC survey of CEOs worldwide is anything to go by, then it would seem that ASEAN CEOs look at Singapore as the most important city for their organisation's growth.

According to the study, 37% of ASEAN CEOs tag Singapore as a launch pad for their firms. This came against the the backdrop of CEO confidence in growth prospects that are rising slowly around the world but dropping in ASEAN.

PwC Singapore executive chairman Yeoh Oon Jin said Singapore still received high confidence because of it being one of the most open economies in the world.

“This is reflected clearly in this year’s survey results which show that Singapore (37%) is the most important city named by ASEAN CEOs for their organisation’s overall growth prospects, ahead of Kuala Lumpur (23%), Jakarta (23%), New York (13%), London (12%), Beijing (12%), and Hong Kong (12%)," he said.

Meanwhile, ASEAN CEOs' 37% confidence in revenue growth are at a three-year low compared to 47% in 2015 and 38% in 2016. In Singapore, although 50% of Singapore CEOs are “somewhat confident” of revenue growth over the next 12 months, only 26% are “very confident”. When asked about the longer term of three years, 56% of Singapore CEOs are “very confident”.

More so, Singapore CEOs’ top concerns are uncertain economic growth (88%), over-regulation (85%) and terrorism (85%) and protectionism (79%).