Bankruptcy Numbers Show Fall From Last Year
Despite the fact that the worldwide economy is on a slippery slope it seems that less people filed for bankruptcy in the first quarter of 2008 compared to the same period last year. Figures released by the Ministry of Justice show that 13,080 people filed for individual bankruptcy in the first three months of 2008, a fall of 13% compared to the same period last year.
However, the figures are well up on the 11,674 who filed for bankruptcy in the final three months of 2007. So are we out of the woods yet? Is the worst over?
The general consensus seems to be that the worldwide economy may have further to fall before we shake out the affects of the credit crunch. History also shows that bankruptcy petitions always lag the performance of the economy as it takes time for job losses and rising debts to force people to take such a decision. It will be interesting to see how the figures progress for 2008 as a whole, a year which many people believe could be one of the worst on record for the worldwide economy.
Many people are also looking towards the number of corporate bankruptcies as a measure of how the economy is performing, something we will cover elsewhere on the site.
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