EU business registrations decline in Q2

By Yunus Girgin

ANKARA (AA) - The seasonally adjusted business registrations in the EU declined in the second quarter of the year compared to the previous quarter, the bloc’s statistical authority said on Wednesday.

Data released by Eurostat showed that the figure was also down in the euro area over the same period. The fall was 20.5% in EU and 20.4% in euro area in the first quarter.

The eurozone/euro area or EA19 represents member states that use the single currency -- euro -- while the EU27 includes all member countries of the bloc.

The number of new business registrations have been on the rise in the EU since 2015, until the end of 2019. From that day on, the trend was broken for the first time in the first quarter of 2020.

"In the first quarter of 2020, when COVID-19 containment measures started being widely introduced by EU states, the number of registrations of businesses had been down by 14.2% in the euro area and by 13.9% in the EU, compared with the last quarter of 2019," Eurostat said.

In the second quarter of 2020, the seasonally adjusted number of declarations of bankruptcies also decreased both in the EU and euro area by 26.5% and 35.8% respectively, comparing with the first quarter of 2020.

In the first quarter, declarations of bankruptcies had fallen by 15% in the EU and 15.7% in the euro area, it said.

Eurostat noted that for bankruptcies, measures taken by governments supporting businesses during the crisis may have allowed businesses that would otherwise have filed for bankruptcy to continue their activities.