According to Statistics Netherlands, sixteen more companies were declared bankrupt in May than in April, an increase of 7%. The number of bankruptcies filed peaked at 911 in May 2013. Thereafter, the number of bankruptcies decreased until August 2017, after which the trend remained rather flat until mid-2020.
Since then, the number of bankruptcies has continued to decline, with a record low in August 2021. Since May 2022, the number of bankruptcies has been consistently higher than in the same month of the previous year.
Crown support
The fact that the number of bankruptcies has been quite low for some time is partly due to earlier crown support from the Cabinet, which also meant that companies that weren’t fundamentally sound could survive. Meanwhile, businesses are no longer primarily afflicted by the coronavirus, but by sharply rising energy prices and high inflation in general. The government has also provided support for this. However, experts predict that a wave of bankruptcies could be imminent later this year.
As in previous months, trade in May was the sector in which the largest number of bankruptcies were declared, i.e. 45. That is 5 percent more than in April. The construction sector follows with 44, against 29 the previous month. Both sectors are among the largest industries. Relatively speaking, most of the bankruptcies were filed in May in the hospitality sector. There, 33 companies went bankrupt, up from 17 in April.