A minor increase in consumer confidence in June 2021. The trend of increasing CCI continued from March 2021, this time with a slight 0.9 percentage point increase (from -33.2 in May to -32.1 in June) after a significant jump of 5 points from the previous month.
There was a significant increase in confidence during May 2021. The small rebound observed in April accelerated to 5 percentage points in May (from -38.2 in April to -33.2 in May), while both sub-indices (the Present Situation Index and the Expectations Index) moved in tandem.
Modest increase in confidence – Consumer confidence improved by a slight 0.8 percentage points in April (from -39.0 in March to -38.2 in April). Unlike in several of the previous consecutive months, however, the Present Situation Index and the Expectations Index did not move in tandem: while there are higher hopes for the future, perceptions of the present have deteriorated (see Chart 1).
World economies hampered by the pandemic; countries facing public healthcare crises, with millions killed by COVID-19; thousands of cities under lockdown; social distancing and transformed social practices; countless institutions functioning online; the youth spending endless days and nights in front of computer screens; and, globally, over a year of online education. This is the reality in many countries around the world, including Georgia, in the spring of 2021.
The CCI deteriorated in March. We had hoped that the recovery of the Consumer Confidence Index, observed since December 2020, would bring the Index back to the levels observed last summer. Unfortunately, the trend reversed in March and the CCI decreased, from -35.5 in February to -39.0 in March.