While medium-sized businesses are pessimistic about the economy, they’re confident in themselves. J.P. Morgan’s 2025 Business Leaders Outlook Pulse Survey found that even though optimism for the national economy fell by more than half in the last six months—with just under a third feeling positive about the big picture—85% project steady to increased company performance through the end of the year.

More than half of business leaders—58%—said they feel optimistic about their company performance. And while that’s a substantial drop from the 75% who felt upbeat in a December survey, it’s still a significant number, especially as 32% of business leaders either expect a recession this year or think we’re already experiencing one.

A significant number of business leaders—44%—said they’ve held off on their plans for the year. Almost three-quarters say that decision is the result of policy uncertainty. And companies cite uncertain economic conditions as their top challenge, followed by tariffs. However, businesses aren’t stopping at all, with 14% accelerating their plans for 2025, seeing how things go in the uncertain economy. Depending on how things pan out, this year may truly be one of the more challenging times to prove business resilience.

Policy and tariffs aside, technology advances and the rise of AI are also moving the business world. Who at your company should take the lead? Chad Hesters, CEO of executive search firm Boyden, has helped several companies figure that out and spoke with me about the process. An excerpt from our conversation is later in this newsletter.

We’re taking a summer break and will not be publishing Forbes CEO next week. We’ll be back on Monday, July 14.

President Donald Trump holds up a chart at the "Liberation Day" trade announcement in April.

Stock markets finally fully recovered last week from their early April “Liberation Day” drop, when President Donald Trump announced his slate of sweeping tariffs on other nations. The S&P 500 and Nasdaq hit their first highs in four months this week, setting a record level for both indexes on Friday. Leading analysts aren’t optimistic that the highs will keep coming, though. JPMorganChase top global strategist Dubravko Lakos-Bujas forecast the S&P will end the year 2% lower than Friday, citing the “lagged effects of new policies (i.e., tariffs, immigration, DOGE).”

Stocks have been able to rebound because, for the most part, the tariff threat has only been just that. While Trump has announced dates by which different tariffs would go into effect, those deadlines have often been moved forward or paused to allow for negotiations. And negotiations have been ongoing, sometimes to benefit the United States. After Trump abruptly ended negotiations on Friday with Canada over that country’s new digital service tax—a 3% charge on foreign tech companies for revenue generated from Canadian users—the Canadian government decided over the weekend to rescind the tax. Stocks were slightly up after markets opened Monday morning.

But tariffs—and how suddenly they may go into effect—loom large.

© Forbes