During the economic crisis, more companies in Germany went bankrupt than in more than ten years.
In 2025, the district courts registered 24,064 filed company insolvencies, 10.3 percent more than in the previous year, as the Federal Statistical Office announced. In December alone there was an increase of almost 14 percent.
“2025 was an extremely weak year for Germany as a business location,” said DIHK chief analyst Volker Treier. “On average, a company in Germany had to file for bankruptcy every 20 minutes.” The war in the Middle East endangers the already fragile situation. “Rising energy prices and fears of new disruptions in supply chains are putting many companies under additional pressure.”
The number of company bankruptcies had already grown by more than 20 percent in 2023 and 2024. Measured against this, the increase leveled off last year. “The last time the number of corporate bankruptcies was higher than in 2025 was in 2014 with 24,085 cases,” the statisticians wrote. However, old highs have not been reached: During the financial crisis of 2009, the number of corporate bankruptcies climbed to 32,687 cases.
The number of consumer bankruptcies is increasing
The German economy has been hit by a wave of bankruptcies for years. Private individuals are also increasingly finding themselves in financial distress. According to statisticians, there were 77,219 consumer bankruptcies in 2025 – 8.4 percent more than in the previous year.
Fewer major bankruptcies
Creditors’ claims from corporate insolvencies amounted to around 47.9 billion euros in 2025 – significantly less than the previous year’s 58.1 billion euros. Because there were more major bankruptcies in 2024. Based on 10,000 companies, there were 69 bankruptcies last year. The transport and warehousing sectors as well as the hospitality and construction industries were hardest hit.
Fragile situation – will it improve in 2026?
The Federal Association of German Volksbanks and Raiffeisenbanks (BVR) is cautiously optimistic that the insolvency situation will improve somewhat this year. However, the prerequisite is that the Iran war ends in a few weeks and energy prices fall quickly again.
“In this case, corporate bankruptcies are expected to fall by 3.7 percent to 23,100 cases in 2026 and consumer bankruptcies are expected to fall slightly by 1.0 percent to 76,500 cases,” said BVR chief economist Andreas Bley. If energy prices continue to rise over a long period of time, the number of insolvencies could rise again.
From the point of view of the credit agency Crif, the mood of companies has improved somewhat, but the situation remains tense, especially with the Iran war. “Many of the positive signals from the past few months are losing their impact as energy and procurement costs for numerous industries continue to rise,” says Germany Managing Director Frank Schlein. A good ten percent of all companies are now at risk of insolvency.