Consumer and business confidence nosedive on P.E.I.

To the long list of things unprecedented during the pandemic on P.E.I., you can now add record low business and consumer confidence.

The Canadian Federation of Independent Business has been measuring confidence with its business barometer since 2000, and Narrative Research has been measuring consumer confidence for more than 25 years..

Both surveys hit historic lows in May.

Narrative's consumer confidence index for P.E.I. dropped to 77.7, down 30.4 points since February. The index has never fallen below 80 before.

The CFIB business barometer crashed to 30. The previous low was 43.9 in March 2009.

The barometer has been volatile on the Island.

In the early days of the pandemic, when the national rating fell to 30.8, P.E.I.'s was soaring at 70. Early in May it was still at 47.6, close to the national level.

"Optimism fluctuates from month to month and at this point that's a snapshot in time," said Louis-Philippe Gauthier, CFIB's director of provincial affairs for New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island.

Gauthier noted this particular survey went out just before Phase 2 lifting of restrictions on the Island started, so business owners would have been at a low ebb.

"Either because of the restrictions, or because of the lack of customers or reduced customer spending they're not going to be making as much money as they used to, but their fixed costs are still there," he said.

P.E.I. leads the country in the number of businesses open, and Gauthier expects confidence will rebound in the next survey.

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