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Shopping street in downtown Hamburg: Small businesses in particular affected
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Chris Emil Janssen / imago images / Chris Emil Janssen
According to economic experts, Germany is threatened with a significant increase in corporate insolvencies.
In a joint study, the credit agency Creditreform and the Leibniz Center for European Economic Research (ZEW) reported that state aid had kept around 25,000 companies alive artificially during the corona crisis.
Patrik-Ludwig Hantzsch from Creditreform gives the reasons for the impending increase from the second half of 2021:
An undifferentiated distribution of aid money
Lack of opening perspectives
the ongoing moratorium on bankruptcy.
Small businesses are particularly affected by the impending bankruptcies.
Only half as many bankruptcies in restaurants as expected
The experts relied on the evaluation of the creditworthiness data of around 1.5 million companies.
"It showed that especially small, financially weak companies, which under normal economic circumstances would have gone into bankruptcy with a high probability, were kept alive with no prospect of successful restructuring through government aid," said Simona Murmann, one of the authors of Study.
In the sectors particularly affected by the crisis, such as the catering industry, less than half as many companies would have filed for bankruptcy than would have been expected on the basis of previous years.
Overall, a backlog of 25,000 bankruptcies has formed.
The experts from Creditreform and ZEW are not alone in their assessment.
Just a week ago, the Crifbürgel credit agency forecast that the number of company bankruptcies could more than double this year compared to 2020.
A total of 35,500 company insolvencies are possible.
More than 300,000 companies are currently in financial difficulties.
However, this has not yet been reflected in the insolvency figures.
According to experts, the postponement of the negative consequences of the shutdown will primarily affect creditors, i.e. suppliers and landlords.
They would have to fear that they would be left with their debts due to bankruptcy and that they would not get their money.
apr / dpa
