A general view taken through barbed wire shows the alpine resort of Davos, the day before the opening of the 40th annual meeting of the World Economic Forum. [CFP]

With their worst fears of prolonged recession behind them, CEOs' confidence for future growth has bounced back from the gloomy prospects of a year ago, according to a global CEO survey released on Tuesday.

Overall, 81 percent of CEOs worldwide are confident of their prospects for the next 12 months, while only 18 percent said they remained pessimistic, said the annual survey, which was published by PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) ahead of the World Economic Forum annual meeting in Davos.

In comparison, 64 percent of CEOs said they were confident of their growth a year ago while 35 percent were pessimistic.

The survey also showed that 31 percent of CEOs were "very confident" of their short-term prospects, up 10 percentage points from last year.

But there is a striking difference in confidence levels among CEOs in emerging economies and those in developed nations. In North America and Western Europe, for example, about 80 percent of CEOs said they were confident of growth in 2010. That compared with 91 percent in Latin America and China, and 97 percent in India.

For the longer term, the results were more even. Overall, more than 90 percent of CEOs expressed confidence in growth over the next three years.