As measured by NAB's Monthly Business Survey, business confidence across Australia reached its highest level since May 2002 in November, with led the major bank to increase its growth forecast and substantially lower the unemployment forecast.

For the month of November, the level of confidence among business owners grew by another 3 points to hit 19 points, which is indicative of the fact that most of the businesses are now much optimistic in their outlook about the coming times.

Although a slight fall was recorded for current business conditions and earnings, they were still registered as being in the positive territory, which has further prompted the bank to nudge its economic forecast higher.

The NAB now says that the country's economy is expected to grow by nearly 2.75% in 2010, and unemployment by mid-next year is expected to peak at 6.2%.

"We continue to see the RBA increasing rates in each of its next two meetings (February and March). The stronger economy could have raised the risk of [the] RBA doing more but, on the other hand, the action of some banks in increasing rates by more than the RBA has partially offset that risk", the NAB report noted.

Most measures of business confidence and conditions have also been recorded as well above long-term averages by the survey.