Construction-sector companies and investors at an early December publicly owned firm investment conference sponsored by Credit Suisse are bracing for tougher market conditions ahead, but are buoyed by improvements in risk allocation and technology, according to the investment banking firm’s analysis of attendee comments and predictions.

“The tone for 2020 for most all equipment firms was to brace for a sales decline broadly,” says Credit uisse managing director and lead industry analyst Jamie Cook, with truck producers to be hardest hit, followed by manufacturers serving construction, mining and energy markets.

She says sales in the North American fracking sector “are viewed as near or at bottom, [with] no expectation of recovery.” Equipment makers are actively cutting production and proactively streamlining costs, she says, adding that they project a downturn to last four to six quarters.

Design and construction company sentiment was somewhat more optimistic.”The opportunity for 2020 top line growth … seems very achievable,” says Cook, driven by LNG, petrochemical, 5G and wireline, electric transmission and distribution and gas pipeline project work.

She notes that because “there are not many EPC contractors that can take on megaprojects left in the space, Fluor Corp. is one that has been seeing the pendulum swing more favorably and has been making significant progress in pushing back on discussions to more balanced risk.”

According to Cook, “force majeurerisk has historically been borne by the contractor but recently there has been more shift to the client.”

She notes Fluor’s interest in emerging LNG opportunity, but says with large sector projects in Canada and Africa, the firm “will remain disciplined” in fixed price work risk. It also sees growth in chemical projects, particularly in Europe, refinery work and U.S. infrastructure.

Cook says MasTec Inc.’s telecom construction expertise will boost its potential in a new 5G network infrastructure market that is set to be “completely different” in complexity than 3G and 4G installation.

尽管看跌了预测，但有62％的投资者在会议上进行了调查，预计明年的经济现状，其中51％的投资者表示标准普尔500指数将上升。大约36％的投资者表示，电气化和脱碳将是工业公司最具破坏性的技术，但有62％的人表示，公众没有为这种变化做好准备。