AMSTERDAM - Corrected for hearing days, Dutch courts declared 706 businesses bankrupt in January and February 2024. That is 40 percent more bankruptcies than a year earlier, Statistics Netherlands (CBS) reported on Tuesday. “The underlying trend in the number of bankruptcies has been increasing for almost two years,” the statistics office said. 

Businesses were declared bankrupt 340 times in February. That is a month-on-month decline of 7 percent compared to the 366 bankruptcies in January, but a 24 percent increase compared to a year earlier. 

It’s the highest number of business bankruptcies in the month of February since 2017, when 351 businesses went bust, including freelancers and sole proprietors. It is also the highest number of business bankruptcies for the first two months of the year since 2017, when 747 companies entered bankruptcy. 

The trade sector saw the highest number of bankruptcies in February 2024 at 65. Trade is also one of the sectors with the largest number of companies. Relatively, the hospitality sector had the most bankruptcies at 31. 

According to CBS, the number of bankruptcies adjusted for court days fluctuates considerably, with declines and increases following each other in rapid succession. However, the underlying trend of bankruptcies in the Netherlands has been rising since May 2022. From that month, “the number of bankruptcies was continuously higher than in the same month a year earlier.”