The pandemic had "a significant impact" on the Italian economy, with a drop in Gross Domestic Product of 8.9% in 2020.
However, compared to 2019, there have been fewer bankruptcies and, more generally, fewer exits from the business market: in 2020 just under 7,400 companies started an insolvency procedure, compared to almost 11 thousand in 2019, with a decrease of about one third). Even in 2021, the level of bankruptcies remained below that of 2019.
These are the numbers reported in the Note published by the Bank of Italy entitled "The impact of Covid-19 on bankruptcies and market exits of Italian companies", which analyzed the data contained in the Business Register available on InfoCamere.
Although part of the decline in the number of bankruptcies can be attributed to the moratorium on bankruptcy filings, the reduction, the report reads, is primarily "attributable to a broad set of economic support measures adopted by the government" during the months acute cases of the pandemic.
In the absence of the intervention, according to the elaboration of some scenarios of evolution of short-term bankruptcies, the number could have exceeded 12 thousand units, almost 4,800 more than those actually observed.
(Unioneonline / F)