Companies in difficulty are decreasing, the Guarantee Fund is decisive

The intervention of the Guarantee Fund was important in the recovery process: in the two-year period 2020-21, 28.8% (8,102) of the companies considered zombies in 2019 received loans backed by public guarantees: almost 70% of them (against 43.1% of those not financed) managed to get back on their feet thanks to 3.1 billion euros of resources.

However, the remaining 30.4% have exited the market or are still in difficulty, taking with them 1.3 billion in lost loans. In total, in the two-year period 2020-21, the restored zombie companies exceeded 40 thousand units.

«The reasons why this happens are linked to safeguarding the country’s economic stability and employment levels – comments Andrea Mignanelli, CEO of Cerved – as well as the need to contain the risk of insolvency and the generation of new non-performing loans. However, the presence of “zombie” companies weighs on the production system, because it diverts capital that could guarantee higher returns and greater productivity elsewhere, makes it difficult for healthy companies and startups to access credit, contributes to stagnation and discourages the entry of new operators. It also increases the cost of money and makes the system more exposed to the transmission of financial shocks. The crisis generated by Covid has been managed with aid and loans. Now, however, targeted interventions are needed, based on tools, data and technologies that allow for a correct screening of the companies in which to invest”.

If in numerical terms in the three-year period this audience has decreased (by just under 5 thousand units), the same has not happened for total debts, which have remained unchanged at 130 billion, with an average debt per company that between 2019 and 2021 goes from 4, 6 to 5.6 million euros, an evident legacy of the higher costs contracted to deal with the Covid emergency.

Where do recovery paths take place most frequently?