Confidence among US business leaders has deteriorated sharply since the start of the year, with 82% of executives saying they are more concerned about their company's future now than they were in January, according to new midyear research from mutual insurer Sentry.
The figures, published in Sentry's 2026 C-Suite Stress Index: Midyear Report, updated the insurer's original C-Suite Stress Index survey conducted late last year and reflect how shifting trade policy, geopolitical instability and operational disruption have reshaped executive thinking over the first half of 2026.
Nearly all executives surveyed, or 98%, said events during that period have changed how they approach long-term planning and risk management.
The drop in confidence is far steeper among smaller companies. Ninety percent (90%) of executives at businesses with 10 to 49 employees said they are more concerned following this year's events, a 21 percentage point jump from where they stood at the start of 2026. That compares with 69% of executives at companies with more than 1,000 employees, a meaningful gap that points to smaller firms having less financial cushion to absorb shocks.
Small business leaders were also far more likely to report tangible fallout rather than just heightened worry. Sixty-five percent (65%) said they had already experienced negative impacts from geopolitical events, and 95% said they were struggling to keep pace with how quickly external risks are evolving.
Brett Hoopingarner, national sales director for direct writer and life and annuities at Sentry, said smaller firms are structurally more exposed to disruption.
"Resilience isn't about the size of a business, it's about the ability to adjust," Hoopingarner said. He added that businesses working closely with trusted advisors, including their agent and insurer, tend to make more informed decisions in the current environment.
Executives are not just more anxious in the abstract. Concern over supply chain and logistics disruption rose 17 percentage points to 62%, tariff and trade uncertainty climbed 13 points to 52%, and worry about labor shortages increased 11 points to 49%.
Those increases track closely with what other risk advisors have been documenting throughout the year, including Marsh's warning that businesses should treat elevated trade friction as the new baseline heading into the USMCA review and Allianz Trade's finding that roughly 90% of industries now sit in medium or high sensitivity risk zones.
Rather than sitting still, most executives said they are adapting their planning approach. Seventy percent (70%) reported shortening their planning horizons and 61% said they are building more contingencies into their strategy. Geopolitical risk in particular is proving hard to plan around, with 88% of executives saying the pace of change makes it difficult to manage those risks accurately.
Jeff Cole, assistant vice president of national accounts at Sentry, said the nature of the challenge has shifted this year.
"What's changed since the beginning of the year isn't simply the list of risks businesses are managing, it's how fast risks evolve and are affecting one another," Cole said. He noted that organizations reassessing their risk exposure more regularly tend to build more flexibility into their decision-making.
For agents and brokers working with small and midsize commercial clients, this data points to a widening advisory opportunity rather than just a sentiment shift. Clients under 50 employees are the group least equipped to absorb tariff-driven cost increases or supply disruption on their own, and many are actively looking for guidance on how to respond.
That aligns with what Gallagher found earlier this year, when 63% of business owners said they were concerned about supply chain disruption in 2026 while remaining largely unaware of how limited their contingent business interruption coverage actually is against tariff-related triggers.
The Sentry findings also arrive against a backdrop of genuine legal uncertainty on tariffs themselves, following the Supreme Court's ruling earlier this year that the administration exceeded its authority in imposing broad emergency tariffs. That ruling did not eliminate trade policy risk, since Washington retains narrower tools to target specific products or countries, meaning brokers advising clients on contingency planning are working against a policy backdrop that could shift again before year-end.
Brokers with clients under 50 employees have a specific, immediate action available given the Gallagher findings above: a direct review of contingent business interruption limits and supply-chain-dependency wording, since that's precisely the coverage gap most likely to surface only after a client's supplier or logistics partner is disrupted by a tariff action or trade policy shift, rather than something a client would think to raise on their own.
