When much of the world’s economy shut down after the outbreak of COVID-19 in 2020, businesses across the U.S. were on the ropes. In total, 639 U.S. corporations went bankrupt that year, according to an analysis by S&P Global. Despite the Federal Reserve slashing interest rates to near zero and Congress unveiling the $2.2 trillion Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act to help keep Main Street afloat, it was a disastrous year for American businesses.
But surprisingly, in 2023, rising interest rates and wages have led to even more bankruptcies than during the height of the pandemic among the U.S.’s biggest firms. There were 642 total corporate bankruptcy filings last year, a 13-year high, according to a new report from S&P Global. That’s not only and more than there were in 2020—when, as S&P Global notes, there was “a flurry of COVID-19 pandemic-related filings”—it’s also 72% more bankruptcies than there were in 2022.
And the true carnage was even more dire than the statistics indicate, when you consider that S&P Global’s methodology only factors in bankruptcies by public companies with assets and liabilities over $2 million, as well as private companies with assets and liabilities over $10 million.
Despite Wall Street’s nearly consensus forecast for interest rate cuts and a soft landing (when inflation fades without a job-killing recession), S&P Global warned that corporations will face the same issues this year as they did in 2023. “Although investors expect the Federal Reserve to cut interest rates as early as March, companies will still have to contend with relatively high interest rates and robust wage growth in the near term,” they wrote Tuesday.
Joseph Acosta, a partner focused on bankruptcies at the international law firm Dorsey & Whitney, echoed those comments, warning it could be a tough year for many already ailing U.S. corporations. “In a high interest rate environment, where debt service obligations are rising, there are surely many other companies who simply won’t be able to pay their bills like they used to,” he told Fortune.
That could mean 2024 features another slate of big name bankruptcies. Last year, the office leasing giant WeWork, the electric scooter company Bird Global, and the retailer Bed Bath & Beyond all filed for bankruptcy. A number of sectors, from office real estate to brick and mortar retailers, are now not only struggling with higher borrowing and wage costs, they’re watching their industries change in front of them after the pandemic.
The rise of remote work as well as the shifting of supply chains and the birth of new technologies like AI after the pandemic have left some business models broken. Dorsey & Whitney’s Acosta warned that he believes “we have not remotely finished seeing the wake of the pandemic and its effects on major industries.”
