Women Business Owners Are the Most Bullish in 4 Years, Bank of America Says

(Bloomberg) -- Women business owners are feeling good.

Over the next 12 months, 73% of female entrepreneurs plan to expand their enterprises and 62% expect revenue to climb, according to a Bank of America Corp. survey of 1,323 small-business owners in the U.S. Those projections are the highest in four years and mark the first time since 2017 that women responding were more optimistic than men, the study showed.

“Women are starting to see other women who are successful,” Sharon Miller, Bank of America’s head of small business, said in an interview. “That helps with confidence.”

While women entrepreneurs expressed confidence in their local and national economies, they cited health-care costs, the political environment and consumer spending as their biggest concerns.

Of the female business owners surveyed, 12% of said they intended to apply for a loan in the next year. That’s despite the view of 24% of women respondents that female entrepreneurs will never have equal access to capital.

--With assistance from Gwen Everett.

To contact the reporter on this story: Lananh Nguyen in New York at lnguyen35@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Michael J. Moore at mmoore55@bloomberg.net, Dan Reichl, David Scheer

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