The number of companies in financial difficulty will continue to rise despite any upswing in the economy, insolvency company Begbies Traynor has predicted .
It reports pre-tax profits up from £5.7 million to £7.2 million, and predicts that industrial dark clouds will continue to provide silver linings even after the economy recovers.
It said there were nearly 22,000 corporate insolvencies in 2008, a 38% increase on the previous year.
High-profile cases included Southampton Leisure Holdings, the parent company of Southampton Football Club, which helped boost revenues by 29% to £62.1 million for an insolvency operation reckoned to be the biggest in the UK.
The Manchester-based firm says that it handled 1,800 corporate cases in the year to April 30, an increase of around 38% on the same period last year.
Says a spokesman: "We believe that the volumes of corporate and personal insolvencies, as with levels of unemployment, tend to be indicators that lag any change in economic activity and are therefore likely to continue to rise after the commencement of economic recovery."
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