Consumer confidence in Jamaica fell slightly in the second quarter of 2026 while business confidence improved slightly, a reversal of the findings in the previous quarter when consumer confidence improved while business confidence dipped.
Consumer confidence fell by 2.3 per cent in the second quarter of 2026, which reversed in part the improvement of 5.7 per cent in the previous quarter as the economy recovered from the devastation of Hurricane Melissa in October 2025, according to the Business and Consumer Confidence survey conducted by Market Research Services (MRS).
Meanwhile, business confidence improved by 2.3 per cent in the second quarter of 2026, a reversal from the first quarter of the year when business confidence slumped by 6.5 per cent.
Don Anderson, chairman and CEO of MRS, said the reversal in consumer confidence is typical of the year following a general election, and also reflects a level of cautiousness being expressed by the Jamaican public.
“The peaks that you see there are typical of election years…those peaks represent promises that are bought into, and then fall off when they are not fulfilled,” Anderson said, referring to a chart of the survey’s findings over the years.
MRS has conducted the survey Business and Consumer Confidence Indices every quarter since 2001 under the auspices of the Jamaica Chamber of Commerce (JCC).
“Consumers are becoming cautious, conscious of challenges, wary of what is happening down the road; and what we find is that they have a less positive view of current business conditions,” Anderson said in presenting the findings at The Jamaica Pegasus hotel in New Kingston on Tuesday July 21.
The MRS chairman said businesses are becoming more bullish, with more expressing a willingness to expand their operations.
“Even though those numbers fell off in the second quarter of 2025, we can see that businesses were still of the opinion that it was a good time to invest… . That was maintained with a slight improvement this quarter over the first quarter. So we can see businesses trying to pull themselves back,” Anderson said.
luke.douglas@gleanerjm.com
