The creditor protection association Creditreform expects that price increases in almost all areas of life, especially housing, fuel and energy, will lead to an increase in private bankruptcies this year. Corona pandemic, shortage of skilled workers, inflation and supply chain problems weighed on the domestic economy. After the expiry of state corona aid for companies and private individuals, insolvencies in Austria are moving back towards the pre-pandemic level. In the first three months of 2022, the number of bankruptcies more than doubled to 1,055, almost reaching the pre-crisis level, according to the final figures from Creditreform on Friday.
The total number of personal insolvencies also rose by around 22 percent to 2,301 procedures. This is mainly due to the reform of insolvency and execution law passed in July 2021, which led to a trend reversal. According to Creditreform, the faster debt relief options would find increasing acceptance.
For 2022 as a whole, Creditreform Managing Director Gerhard Weinhofer expects a return to the pre-pandemic level of around 5,000 company insolvencies. Weinhofer assumes that private bankruptcies will rise to over 9,000. It remains to be seen what effects the further course of the Ukraine war will have on general economic development as well as digitization and climate change on the labor market and thus on insolvencies, according to Weinhofer, according to a broadcast.
The strongest growth in company insolvencies in the first quarter was recorded in Tyrol (+309.5 percent), Lower Austria (+196 percent) and Vorarlberg (+182 percent). The highest level of insolvency was in the federal capital Vienna with almost 4 insolvencies per 1,000 companies, the lowest in Vorarlberg with less than 2 out of 1,000 companies. Across Austria, 3 out of 1,000 companies had to file for insolvency.
Insolvencies in the transport sector rose the most with an increase of 156.5 percent, followed by tourism with an increase of 132 percent. Construction (192), trade (178) and services (166) registered the highest number of bankruptcy filings. The greatest relative insolvency affected was also in construction with around 8 out of 1,000 industry companies.
More than a third of all private insolvencies occurred in Vienna. 6 out of 10,000 adults in Vienna had to file for bankruptcy. This means that people in Vienna are twice as likely to become insolvent as the average, because only a little more than 3 out of 10,000 adults in Austria were insolvent.
Source: Nachrichten
