In its latest survey by Bank of America Merrill Lynch, one-third (34 percent) of the global fund managers think a recession will be likely seen in the next 12 months. This extent of fear of a recession has been the highest in 8 years, the survey said.

A total of 224 panelists with $553 billion in assets under management participated in the survey which was conducted between 2 and 8 August. Their dominant concerns have been the euro-zone debt, growth in China, populism, trade wars and quantitative tightening.

Further, half of the participating managers felt that corporates were excessively leveraged and should take steps to use cash to improve balance sheets rather than capex or buybacks.

In a different survey released by the National Association for Business Economists on Monday, a majority of the economists pushed their expectations of the next recession from occurring this year to 2020 or 2021. However, this recession is expected in the US, which had not affected India gravely in its previous occurrence in 2008.

In the most recent release of GDP (gross domestic product) results in the European region, the zone's driving economies-Germany and the UK, reported a drop in their numbers. Germany reported a 0.1 percent fall in its GDP for the June quarter, while the UK's economy shrank 0.2 percent (its first dip in 7 years). Another contraction (that is two consecutive contractions) will theoretically mean a recession in these economies.