End of debt moratorium ‘unlikely to cause bankruptcy wave’, survey says

Szazadveg said that some companies, however, may experience difficulties if the moratorium were to end fully and with immediate effect.

The survey conducted in February showed that only 6 percent of companies had made use of the optional loan repayment moratorium and the majority did not expect that loan repayments would cause problems, even in the second half of the year, the think tank said.

Among those that did take advantage of the moratorium, the majority (74 percent) spent the money to finance operations and 16 percent invested it. More than 55 percent of the companies surveyed said their revenues shrunk in the recent period, Szazadveg added.

Szazadveg said that, according to official statistics, two-thirds of Hungarian companies finance their operations without taking out loans, and among the businesses surveyed, 71.2 percent said they had no loans on their books during the moratorium period.