Small business owners continued to deliver a spectacular performance with September's third highest Index reading in the survey's 45 year history. The Index fell slightly from August's survey record breaking high of 108.8 to 107.9. Six of the ten Index components declined, three advanced and one was unchanged, exactly reversing last month's gain. Most of the decline came in the "hard" components of the Index (down 14 points) but still registered as the second highest reading since 1998, partially offset by some improvement in the expectations components (up 3 points).