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Global CEOs worry about recession, geopolitical concerns

Global CEOs worry about recession, geopolitical concerns

Craig Johnson
| January 13, 2025

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CEOs remained concerned about a potential recession as 2025 gets underway, according to a survey by The Conference Board. And intensified trade wars are CEOs’ top geopolitical risk.

Taking part in the survey were 1,722 C-suite executives and board members, including 508 CEOs, primarily from North America, Europe, Asia and Latin America.

The survey found 46% of CEOs globally identified a downturn/recession as a high-impact issue for 2025, though that is down slightly from 53% in last year’s survey. Recession was the top concern for all regions excluding Japan, where labor shortages ranked No. 1.

In terms of geopolitical risk, US-EU-China relations remained a concern, with 34% of US CEOs citing it as their top issue along with 50% of CEOs in Asia and Europe saying the same.

Other findings in the survey:

  • A quarter of CEOs globally and 36% of C-suite executives named cyberattacks as a high-impact issue for this year.
  • More than half of CEOs in the US, 51%, say the US national debt and deficits are a top concern.
  • CEOs are struggling to integrate AI, and 45% say lack of talent is the top challenge to implementing it.

The Conference Board also released its US Employment Trends Index today. The measure ended 2024 at a six-month high. US employment appears on track to remain stable.

The index ticked up to a reading of 109.70 in December 2024 from a downwardly revised reading of 109.45 in November. The Employment Trends Index is a leading composite index for payroll employment.

“December data highlights that the labor market continues on stable footing even after a long period of normalization during the post-pandemic recovery,” Mitchell Barnes, an economist at The Conference Board, said in a press release. “High employment and wage growth have continued to support strong consumer spending, and we expect labor demand to remain stable as businesses await an uncertain policy and economic environment next year.”