The financial gridlock is going epic, in Romania's economy. The number of companies filing for bankruptcy last month reached 2,000, or 10% more than a month before. Most companies, or 40% of them, were operating in the retail business, while 15% were in the construction sector, 15% were in the manufacturing industries, and 5% in the real-estate business.
The total number of companies filing for bankruptcy in 2009 reached 18,421 according to the National Office for the Registry of Commerce. This was a 25% growth, compared with a year before, when 14,724 companies filed for bankruptcy.
Most bankruptcies in 2009 were filed in the last two months of the year, the statistical data shows. Bucharest ranks first, with 2,109 companies, followed by the counties of Constanta, with 1,042 companies, Bihor, with 984 companies, and Cluj, with 900 companies.
Some one million companies were operating in Romania, by the end of 2009.
A surge in the number of companies closing down occurred after the government started to levy a mandatory minimum tax last year. As a result, about 11 times more companies closed down in 2009, compared with 2008, or 133,362 from 12,019 a year before.
Translated AAP