In total, more than 10,000 employees were affected by the insolvency of their company between January and May. According to statisticians, this number is likely to be even higher in reality, as jobs are often cut before insolvency proceedings begin and the number of employees is not known in all cases. The creditors’ expected claims total a good 1.5 billion euros.
Increase already in 2023
In addition to companies, 4,550 private debtors also applied for insolvency proceedings – 610 or 15.5 percent more than in the same period last year. This means that there were a total of 5,600 corporate and private bankruptcies in the first five months of the year. The data comes from an analysis of insolvency statistics.
The number of corporate bankruptcies had already risen by almost a quarter to 1,875 in 2023. In the long term, however, the number was still comparatively low. Experts had also expected that even more companies would get into trouble this year. Reasons for this include the weakening during the Corona years, high energy prices and increased interest rates. In addition, special rules with which the state had tried to avert a wave of bankruptcies during the pandemic had expired.
