PORTLAND, Maine — BlueTarp Financial, a credit management company for B2B suppliers, released its Q4 2016 Building Supply Index last month at 120.43, a slight improvement from 117.38 in Q4 2015.
Through BlueTarp’s methodology, values below 100 reflect recessionary or recovering performance. Values above 100 reflect healthy economic activity.
In addition to the Building Supply Index, BlueTarp conducts a quarterly survey of its contractors to gauge sentiment on the current and future state of the economy. Most notable was a major upward shift in contractor sentiment when asked about the outlook for growth in 2017. A substantially larger percentage of the population expects growth this year than in BlueTarp’s Q3 pre-election survey. Respondents pointed to tax relief, a more business-friendly environment, and new president-elect, Donald Trump, as explanations for the spike in confidence.
“Our contractor sentiment boost mirrors what’s happening with consumer confidence,” said Scott Simpson, president and CEO of BlueTarp. “We conducted our survey post-election, but before the inauguration, so we’ll be keeping an eye on how expectations match the other economic indicators.”
The report represents trends from 120,000 professional contractor customers and more than 2,000 building material suppliers across the United States. It also incorporates macro-economic drivers including: building permits, construction spend, and consumer confidence, as reported monthly by the Census Bureau and The Conference Board.
Read the entire report and subscribe to additional content here.