CFO.com: NACM’s Credit Managers Index

Interesting story on CFO.com about the latest Credit Managers Index reading from NACM:

As of December 1, the index, based on a survey of about 1,000 trade-credit managers during the last 10 days of the month, had risen to an annual high of 52.3. (A score of 50 means creditors think they’ve entered a growth mode. The index is based on credit managers’ perceptions of growth, decline, or status quo conditions in various aspects of trade credit.)

…the index hit 39.7 during December 2008, the all-time bottom in the index’s seven-year history. Since then, it’s risen steadily to its current annual high. That surge has been cause for an enthusiasm among creditors that’s “not really champagne-cork-opening excitement, it’s wine-box-opening excitement. We’re getting there,” says the NACM’s economist, Chris Kuehl.

That’s a mildly bullish sign, although as the article points out, “a true strengthening…depends on an upsurge in consumer demand.”

[Kuehl's analogy resonates in my house -- it's been a box wine recession for us. In fact, we've been bottle free for so long that we now have a nook carved out among the cookbooks in which a five liter box of cabernet (Almaden or Carlo Rossi, whoever's cheaper) fits like a glove. We're still trying to come up with a clever idea for all those plastic bags though -- suggestions are welcomed!]

URLs:

http://www.cfo.com/article.cfm/14462467

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2003/12/04/WIGV13EPSU1.DTL