Summit Notebook
Exclusive outtakes from industry leaders
Tinkering whilst debt burns
What have Liverpool Football Club, French building materials firm Materis and German forklift truck maker Kion got in common?
They have all been beneficiaries of European banks’ preference to tinker with company balance sheets rather than fundamentally restructure indebted businesses, one speaker said at this week’s restructuring summit.
However, such easy conditions — primarily because banks are reluctant to take big hits on their balance sheets — will not last long if banks’ balance sheets continue to strengthen, speakers said.
“Come the new year there will be a new spate of companies being allowed to go to the wall,” Blackstone’s Simon Davies said.
