{"id":19231,"date":"2024-01-23T21:30:59","date_gmt":"2024-01-23T20:30:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/londoncult.co.uk\/?p=19231"},"modified":"2024-07-20T13:20:44","modified_gmt":"2024-07-20T12:20:44","slug":"47000-british-businesses-on-the-brink-of-collapse","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/londoncult.co.uk\/en\/47000-british-businesses-on-the-brink-of-collapse\/","title":{"rendered":"47,000 British businesses on the brink of collapse"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"s3\"><span class=\"s4\" style=\"letter-spacing: 0em;\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">According to the latest<\/span><\/span><span class=\"s4\" style=\"letter-spacing: 0em;\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\"> \u201c<\/span><\/span><span class=\"s4\" style=\"letter-spacing: 0em;\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">Red Flag<\/span><\/span><span class=\"s4\" style=\"letter-spacing: 0em;\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">\u201d<\/span><\/span><span class=\"s4\" style=\"letter-spacing: 0em;\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\"> report prepared by bankruptcy specialists Begbies Traynor, the United Kingdom is experiencing a serious economic <\/span><\/span><a style=\"letter-spacing: 0em;\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/business\/2024\/jan\/22\/more-than-47000-uk-businesses-on-brink-of-collapse-warn-insolvency-experts\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><span class=\"s5\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">crisis<\/span><\/span><\/a><span class=\"s4\" style=\"letter-spacing: 0em;\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">: more than 47,000 businesses are on the verge of collapse. This alarming discovery follows a 25% increase in the number of companies facing &#8220;critical&#8221; financial difficulties in the last quarter of 2023, the second consecutive period with similarly bleak data.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"s3\"><span style=\"letter-spacing: 0em;\">The report emphasizes that the main burden of economic upheaval has fallen on the construction sector and real estate: they account for 30% of all businesses facing a crisis. Specifically, the number of companies close to bankruptcy in the construction industry increased by 32.6%, in healthcare and education by 41.3%, in real estate by 25%, and in the sector of auxiliary services by 24%.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"s3\"><span class=\"s4\" style=\"letter-spacing: 0em;\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">Bankruptcy experts attribute the sharp increase in the number of financial problems to a combination of factors creating the &#8220;perfect storm&#8221; for British businesses. High interest rates, rampant inflation, low consumer confidence, and unpredictable production costs have <\/span><\/span><a style=\"letter-spacing: 0em;\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/business\/2023\/dec\/11\/uk-insolvencies-high-interest-rates-begbies-traynor\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><span class=\"s5\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">created<\/span><\/span><\/a><span class=\"s4\" style=\"letter-spacing: 0em;\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\"> unprecedented challenges for businesses in all sectors. Additionally, the <\/span><\/span><a style=\"letter-spacing: 0em;\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/business\/2023\/nov\/05\/as-the-bank-of-england-puts-rate-rises-on-hold-what-are-the-ups-and-the-downs\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><span class=\"s5\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">decision<\/span><\/span><\/a><span class=\"s4\" style=\"letter-spacing: 0em;\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\"> of the Bank of England to raise interest rates from 0.1% at the end of 2021 to 5.25%, aimed at curbing inflation, increased the cost of loans and proved <\/span><\/span><a style=\"letter-spacing: 0em;\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/business\/2023\/sep\/15\/number-of-uk-companies-going-bust-in-august-rises-by-a-fifth\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><span class=\"s5\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">detrimental<\/span><\/span><\/a><span class=\"s4\" style=\"letter-spacing: 0em;\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\"> to companies that relied on their availability. Most affected businesses are located in London and the southeast of the country; there are fewer of them in the northeast and in Northern Ireland.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"s3\"><span class=\"s4\" style=\"letter-spacing: 0em;\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">Susanna<\/span><\/span><span class=\"s4\" style=\"letter-spacing: 0em;\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">h<\/span><\/span><span class=\"s4\" style=\"letter-spacing: 0em;\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\"> Streeter, head of the finance and markets department at Hargreaves Lansdown, warned that the number of bankrupt companies has already reached the highest level since the 2008 financial crisis. According to her forecasts, a significant portion of companies currently showing signs of distress may go bankrupt in the next year. As a result, the impending <\/span><\/span><a style=\"letter-spacing: 0em;\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/business\/live\/2024\/jan\/22\/uk-technical-recession-inflation-interest-rates-hedge-fund-profits-business-live?filterKeyEvents=false&amp;page=with:block-65ae0a108f0819b86aada76d#block-65ae0a108f0819b86aada76d\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><span class=\"s5\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">recession<\/span><\/span><\/a><span class=\"s4\" style=\"letter-spacing: 0em;\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\"> in the United Kingdom will become unavoidable.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"s3\"><strong><span style=\"letter-spacing: 0em;\">Top 10 sectors facing a &#8220;critical&#8221; financial crisis:<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p class=\"s3\"><span class=\"s4\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">1. Construction (7,849 businesses)<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"s3\"><span class=\"s4\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">2. Auxiliary services (7,096)<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"s3\"><span class=\"s4\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">3. Real estate and property services (6,228)<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"s3\"><span class=\"s4\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">4. Professional services (4,347)<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"s3\"><span class=\"s4\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">5. Retail trade (3,133)<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"s3\"><span class=\"s4\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">6. Telecommunications and IT (2,830)<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"s3\"><span class=\"s4\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">7. Healthcare and education (2,719)<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"s3\"><span class=\"s4\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">8. Mass media (1,828)<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"s3\"><span class=\"s4\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">9. Financial services (1,373)<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"s3\"><span class=\"s4\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">10. Retail trade in food and pharmaceuticals (1,343)<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>According to the latest \u201cRed Flag\u201d report prepared by bankruptcy specialists Begbies Traynor, the United Kingdom is experiencing a serious economic crisis: more than 47,000 businesses are on the verge of collapse. This alarming discovery follows a 25% increase in the number of companies facing &#8220;critical&#8221; financial difficulties in the last quarter of 2023, the&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":66,"featured_media":19223,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[96,95],"tags":[],"type_post":[],"column":[],"class_list":["post-19231","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/londoncult.co.uk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19231","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/londoncult.co.uk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/londoncult.co.uk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/londoncult.co.uk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/66"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/londoncult.co.uk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19231"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/londoncult.co.uk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19231\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/londoncult.co.uk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19223"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/londoncult.co.uk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19231"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/londoncult.co.uk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19231"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/londoncult.co.uk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19231"},{"taxonomy":"type_post","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/londoncult.co.uk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/type_post?post=19231"},{"taxonomy":"column","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/londoncult.co.uk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/column?post=19231"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}