2019 started off on the wrong foot for Italian companies. In the first quarter of the year, the balance between openings and closures closes with a negative balance of 0,4% compared to the previous three months. In absolute terms we are talking about 21.659 fewer companies.
This is certified by the bulletin drawn up by Unioncamere and InfoCamere on birth and mortality of Italian companies. In detail, in the first quarter of 2019 it was athe number of terminations increased, rising to 136.069 units compared to the 128.628 registered in the period October-December 2018. Registrations, on the other hand, recorded a moderate increase compared to the same reference period.
However, Unioncamere-InfoCamere invite not to dramatize the data, given that traditionally the first quarter of each year represents a period of greater difficulty for companies due to the concentration at the end of the year of a large number of closures, the reflection of which it is recorded in the chamber archives in the first weeks of the new year.
Despite this, the alarm bell should not be underestimated, given that the January-March period puts an end to the return path begun in 2013. In fact, over the last 5 years, the data have always shown a repeated attenuation of business loss. Not only that, the 136.069 terminations in the first quarter costituiscono the least brilliant result of the last five years.
Speaking of individual sectors, the most affected were small craft businesses (which at 31 March were 10.473 fewer than at the end of December), followed by those in the North (6.991 fewer units in the North-West and 6.542 in the North-East, respectively 0,45% and 0,57% in less in the first three months of the year).
Among the legal forms, the ones that suffer the most are the sole proprietorships, (-0,84% against -0,75% in 2018), while less significant, in absolute terms, was the reduction in partnerships (8.318 units, 0,84% less than at the end of December, which equals that of sole proprietorships).
Positive signals come instead from capital company, increased in the first three months of the year by 13.907 units (+0,81%).
