A Problem Emerges With Europe’s “Recovery”: Companies Crippled By Soaring Payment Delays
by Tyler Durden
ZeroHedge.com
May 29, 2017
With Mario Draghi praising the European economy in his quarterly speech at the European Parliament, albeit conceding that inflation is still too low for the ECB to remove its unprecedented monetary support, one would be left with the impression of a slow, steady European recovery, also explaining the recent record inflow into European stocks. Alas, as is often the case, the full story is just below the surface. And it is here that a big problem is emerging.
According to the 2017 European Payment Report compiled annually by Swedish debt collector Intrum Justitia AB, a growing number of small and medium-sized businesses in Europe have complained they face excessive delays in being paid for their work, with large parts of the sector seeking tougher laws to address the problem. First discussed by Bloomberg, the Justitia report reveals that 61% of the 10,468 small and medium-sized companies surveyed say they’ve been asked by counterparties to accept longer payment delays than they feel comfortable with. This is a staggering increase of over 30% in just one year: in 2016, that figure was 46%.
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