Consumers in India were highly optimistic in the second half of the year 2014. This comes at a time when the overall consumer confidence in Asia dipped, reveals a MasterCard Index of Consumer Confidence survey.
India was the second most optimistic nation in Asia with a score of 91.6 coming second to Myanmar that was leading the pack with a score of 97.2. The overall sentiment in Asia witnessed a drop with the consumer confidence index score at 65.5 points down from 68.3 Index points in the first half of 2014.
In the first half of 2014, India figured in the very optimistic range with a total score of 89.1.
In fact, women of the country were more optimistic about the economic outlook, scoring 0.6 points ahead of men. The other optimistic lot was the consumers below 30 years.
Respondents in Bangalore were the most optimistic with a score of 98.1 followed by Delhi with 97.3 points and then Mumbai at the third position with 87.2 points.
The survey tracks five major indicators-employment, economy, regular income, stock market and quality of life. Among these parameters, India rated the highest in its outlook toward employment prospects with a score of 93.5 points in the second half compared to 88.5 points recorded in the first half of the calendar year 2014.
“The optimism reflected among the Indian consumers over the past few quarters remains intact. However, investors would look out for more concrete measures and announcements from the central government in 2015. For consumer confidence to remain buoyant, it is imperative that the government continues to be steadfast in its pursuance of key reforms – the benefits of which will eventually help further boost the consumer sentiment,” said Vikas Varma, Area Head, South Asia, MasterCard.
Some other Asian countries such as Taiwan, Japan and Hong Kong saw a steep decline in consumer confidence. The index stood at 33.8, 34.2 and 40.9 respectively for these three countries.
The Index is based on a survey conducted between October -November last year and covered 8,235 respondents aged 18 – 64 in 16 countries across Asia Pacific.
