CEO confidence holds among headwinds

Supply chain disruptions. High energy prices. Fast-moving AI. Uneven consumer confidence. 

By most objective measures, the business environment is challenging right now. Yet CEOs are largely optimistic about their ability to compete. In a recent follow-up to PwC’s 29th Global CEO Survey, we asked 351 CEOs (a subset of the same group surveyed in late 2025) about what’s changed since then. A sizable share are less confident now, but overall, more are confident about revenue growth over the next 12 months and three years. 

Among CEOs surveyed in both the full CEO Survey and the new Snapshot, the share who are very or extremely confident about their company’s revenue growth over the next 12 months ticked up from 39% to 42%. Confidence about the next three years rose from 46% to 51%. That’s even more noteworthy given that about 70% of CEOs say their company’s energy and non-energy costs have increased because of global shocks in 2026. 

Another key finding is that the value indicators associated with company use of AI remain consistent. In late 2025, only about one-third of CEOs reported revenue gains, cost reductions, or both from AI. The Snapshot suggests that the aggregate picture hasn’t changed dramatically, with a similar proportion of Snapshot CEOs reporting cost decreases (18%), revenue increases (4%), or both (9%).

Nearly four in ten (38%) CEOs say their company has used AI since January 2026 to identify and act on new business opportunities associated with changed conditions, such as shifts in customer demand, opportunities to adapt products or services, or moves into geographic markets where new needs have emerged. In practice, that may mean spotting a demand shift sooner, seeing where a shortage will bite first, or adapting a product or route to market before competitors do.

With the right approach, AI can support revenue growth regardless of the macroeconomic environment. PwC’s Decoding ROI from AI analysis gives some concrete recommendations for how companies can capitalize: 

Focus on business reinvention. Capturing growth opportunities from industry convergence is the strongest factor influencing AI-driven performance. AI leaders are twice as likely as other companies to use the technology to compete beyond their sector. Leaders use AI to identify emerging value pools, then focus on the most attractive opportunities. 

Build the right foundations. Rather than creating each new AI initiative from scratch, AI leaders build on strong foundational capabilities, including workforce skills, modernised tech, high data quality, and governance and risk management. These are repeatable AI assets that can be reused across projects and initiatives. That makes AI cheaper, faster, and more reliable with every deployment.

Invest in agentic AI. With the right guardrails and governance, autonomous agents complement human workers to deliver value at much greater scale—enabling their organisations to think, adapt, and execute faster than competitors. PwC’s AI performance study found that those companies getting the most value from their AI investments are twice as likely to deploy agents as those seeing lower ROI.