The unfolding credit crisis has taken its toll on corporate America’s finance chiefs, whose confidence in both the economy and their own companies’ outlook plunged in the past quarter, according to a survey.

Wall Street’s woes have slowed the pace of economic growth in the US and abroad, forcing chief financial officers to contend with falling demand for goods and services, limited financing options and unprecedented turbulence in the world’s markets. The CFO Optimism Index for the US economy slipped 7.19 points, its steepest ever decline, to 41.73. The poll, conducted by Financial Executives International and Baruch College, also showed that chief financial officers’ outlook for their employers dropped to a record low of 61.74.