|
Filings rise 25% in first quarter
"Bankruptcies by publicly traded US companies rose almost 25 percent in the first quarter and are on pace to top last year's record numbers as crippling debt and a widening telecommunications slump push more businesses into the red."
"The surge in bankruptcy filings, reported by BankruptcyData.com and Palm Beach Gardens, Fla.-based Weiss Ratings, comes despite a modest recovery in the US economy, underscoring the risks of massive debt piled on during the 1990s lending boom, bankruptcy specialists said."
"'It doesn't matter where the economy is today, it's where it was, and there's still a lot of debt that has to be dealt with, both on the corporate side and household sector,' said Samuel Gerdano, executive director of the American Bankruptcy Institute."
"Bankruptcy specialists have predicted that 2002 will set new records for business failures because of massive debt, lingering effects from last year's recession, and a business slump in such major sectors as retail, technology, telecom, and manufacturing."
"Weiss Ratings, which has been issuing risk ratings on about 7,000 publicly traded companies since last November, has 'very weak' ratings assigned to 1,359 companies, indicating a risk of bankruptcy . . . "
9:13:30 AM Google It! 
|
