ICAEW BCM: business confidence boosted by vaccine rollout 18 February 2021: Chartered accountants are confident sales will grow and employment will rise over the next 12 months as the COVID-19 vaccine rollout picks up pace, according to new research from ICAEW. While companies in the UK continued to suffer year-on-year declines in domestic sales (2.2% in Q1 2021), the majority of chartered accountants are hopeful of a return to sales growth (5.2%) in 2021 if the pandemic is contained, according to ICAEW’s Business Confidence Monitor (BCM) for Q1 2021. The regular survey of 1,000 chartered accountants covering a range of UK sectors, regions and company sizes found that business confidence was back into positive territory in Q1 2021. Despite the impact of restrictions on trading, the report suggests that news of vaccine approvals and its subsequent rollout has lifted their expectations for the year ahead.