Mid-sized firms in Asia are highly confident of their growth potential, with Indian business leaders being the most optimistic compared with their regional peers, according to Standard Chartered in a new survey that would bode well for future wealth creation if the firms' confidence proves to be well-founded.

Mid-sized firms in Asia are highly confident of their growth potential, with Indian business leaders being the most optimistic compared with their regional peers, according to Standard Chartered in a new survey that would bode well for future wealth creation if the firms' confidence proves to be well-founded.

The UK-listed bank, which has in the past stressed to this publication the importance of serving business heads in the context of providing wealth management services (see here), polled 300 chief executives and chief financial officers of firms that have an annual turnover of between $30 and $100 million. Businesses in China, India, Malaysia and Indonesia were polled.

Some 90 per cent of those polled said they were confident of their ability to grow their businesses over the next five years with an average anticipated rise in turnover of 39 per cent over that period. The confidence is explained by rising demand for products and services, much of this driven by a growing middle class, the survey said.

Standard Chartered has previously explained that serving business leaders is a key part of its wealth management development because many high net worth individuals in the Asia region are still actively involved with their businesses. It is therefore important, it has said, to keep abreast of business sentiment.

Geographically, Indian business leaders are the most optimistic, with 97 per cent of them confident that their company will grow in the next five years, while Malaysian respondents have slightly more mixed views, with 78 per cent confident in their growth prospects.

Some eight in ten of the companies are international, typically doing business with other companies in the region, including ASEAN, China and South Asia. (The ASEAN region comprises Brunei; Cambodia; Indonesia; Lao PDR; Malaysia; Myanmar; Philippines; Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.)

 ASEAN is the most popular foreign market for business for Indonesia and Malaysia, with 74 per cent of the Indonesian and 76 per cent of the Malaysian companies currently doing business in other ASEAN markets. In India and China, companies also look to Europe as a key trading partner, with as many as 68 per cent of Indian companies and 54 per cent of Chinese companies considering Europe as their preferred foreign market, the Standard Chartered survey found.

The bank said it worked with GlobeScan to conduct this study. GlobeScan is an independent specialist consultancy offering stakeholder intelligence and engagement advisory services to global companies, multilateral organisations and NGOs.