Business failures on downturn
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• More evidence that the minirecession is ending has emerged in the latest figures from business information service Dun & Bradstreet. The number of business failures in the third quarter of 1996 was down 6.6% to 1,548 compared with the same period of 1995 as business recovered from the slowdown.
London businesses benefited most with almost 19% fewer failures—but in the West Midlands the number of failures rose by almost 24%. However, Dun & Bradstreet's Philip Mellor says the figures reflect London's poor showing last year: "The number of London failures were going up dramatically this time last year," he says.
The figures are good news for the British economy because they represent the second consecutive quarterly fall in business failures. Over the First nine months of 1996 they fell by almost 3% to 30,414.