CEOs juggle tariffs, AI lag, and sector shifts while staying bullish on their own firms
Canadian CEOs are more worried about keeping their companies alive in the long run than their global peers – and they are already shifting capital into new sectors and AI to deal with it.
In PwC Canada’s cut of the 29th Global CEO Survey, 41 percent of Canadian CEOs rank “doing enough to ensure their company remains viable in the medium to long term” among their top three concerns, versus 29 percent globally.
Another 35 percent put the risk of “a geopolitical event causing major disruption” in their top three, compared with 21 percent of CEOs worldwide – and that was before recent US military action in Venezuela.
Macro gloom, but confidence in their own firms.
Only 27 percent of Canadian CEOs think domestic economic growth will improve in the next year, down from 42 percent a year earlier, even though 47 percent expect global growth to improve.
Yet 49 percent still expect their own companies to grow revenue over the next three years, in line with global peers. That split matters for anyone looking past top‑down macro calls to company‑level strategy and earnings durability.
Trade and tariffs are reshaping margins and planning.
The survey describes the past year as “a year of adjustment” as Canadian firms tested how long US‑driven trade uncertainty and tariffs might last and how hard they could hit.
More than half (53 percent) of Canadian CEOs say they are concerned or very concerned about US trade policy and tariffs, and only 10 percent are not concerned at all; slightly more than one‑third (35 percent) expect tariffs to compress profit margins over the next year.
The report treats this as structural change in the global trading system, with CUSMA renegotiations and other talks likely to have “significant, long‑term business and investment ramifications” for Canadian exporters and their supply chains.
AI: wide experimentation, slower scale‑up.
Almost all Canadian CEOs (94 percent) have used AI at least to a limited extent across core business areas, but only 29 percent say they have applied AI “to a large extent” across those areas, compared with 43 percent of global CEOs.
Culture and tech are not the main blockers: 72 percent of Canadian CEOs whose organisations have applied AI say their culture enables AI adoption, slightly above the global figure.
The bottleneck is execution: only 37 percent report a clearly defined roadmap for AI initiatives, versus 51 percent globally, and the report links that to ongoing scepticism about AI’s return on investment and a narrow focus on cost‑cutting rather than new revenue.
Sovereign AI and data centres emerge as a long‑term theme.
The report frames sovereign AI as a core part of Canada’s economic and security strategy, arguing that Canada will need its own infrastructure to power compute capacity and AI.
It expects “substantial, accelerated investments” by both private and public sectors to build AI ecosystems and capture a share of the trillions of dollars in data‑centre capital expenditure globally.
Canadian organisations are urged to assess what role they can play in that build‑out to support security, competitiveness and resilience.
New sectors are already moving the revenue mix.
Canadian CEOs appear more willing than their global peers to change where they compete. Fifty‑six percent say their company has begun operating in sectors or industries where it did not compete five years ago, versus 42 percent of global CEOs.
Among those who expanded, 35 percent say at least 20 percent of their company’s revenue over the past five years came from that expansion. Looking ahead, 64 percent expect their firm to grow in at least one sector outside its own within three years.
Where CEOs see the next leg of growth.
When CEOs identify specific targets for cross‑sector growth, 31 percent point to industrials and services, 23 percent to energy, utilities and resources, 21 percent to consumer markets and 20 percent to health industries.
Technology, media and telecommunications attract 16 percent, financial services 11 percent, and private equity, real assets and sovereign funds 5 percent, while 36 percent select “none of the above.”
Policy‑aligned capital is becoming a central lens.
The report notes that governments are becoming “an increasingly important source of capital” rather than just regulators.
In its recent budget, the federal government signalled its intent to “derisk and unlock investment in Canada” and highlighted priority domains such as defence, housing and major projects via vehicles like the Defence Investment Agency, Build Canada Homes and the Major Projects Office.
The report also points to tools such as the Productivity Super‑Deduction as part of a broader push to boost productivity and channel investment into targeted areas.
Overall, the survey argues that Canadian CEOs cannot stay in crisis‑management mode.
It calls for a shift into a reinvention mindset, with more rigorous stress‑testing against geopolitical and trade shocks and more integrated operating models so AI and other technologies can scale across the enterprise.
