Business distress levels fall across the board in NI - bucking wider UK trends

The latest Red Flag Alert data, released every quarter by leading independent financial and real estate advisory group BTG (formerly Begbies Traynor), shows Northern Ireland as the only UK region to see year-on-year reductions in both 'critical' and 'significant' financial distress.

The second quarter of 2026 saw 819 instances of critical financial distress recorded in Northern Ireland, a drop of 2.6% compared with a year earlier, countering a UK average rise of 9%.

In the period to 30th June 2026, there were 10,153 instances of ‘significant’ or early-stage financial distress, a year-on-year reduction of 2.9%, results which have been welcomed by business distress experts at BTG.

The Q2 data showed that there were still pockets of hardship in some key sectors however, with sport & health clubs (+24.7%), media (+7.8%), wholesale (+5.4%) and industrial transportation & logistics (+3.8%) seeing the most notable year-on-year increases in significant financial distress.

Twelve sectors saw also a rise in levels of critical financial distress in Q2 2026 compared with the previous year, including: wholesale (+160%), professional services (+83.3%) and telecommunications & information technology (+43.3%).

Thomas McKay, managing partner for BTG in Scotland and Northern Ireland said:

“We welcome any good news in the data, which overall is not positive for businesses in the UK.

“The trends here are countering the wider averages and that is very good news for the economy and employment in Northern Ireland as a whole, but as ever there are winners and losers, and not every business or sector will be seeing an improvement in trading conditions.

“Dramatic increases in year-on-year critical distress levels in wholesaling, travel and tourism, professional services and telecoms point to acute financial pain in those sectors in the months ahead.

“The less immediate significant distress measures show where problems might be looming on the horizon. Rising levels in sport and health clubs, media and wholesale points to reducing consumer spending, hurting certain sectors in the year ahead.

“The good news in the latest data compared to the overall UK average may only be a temporary situation and there are still challenges ahead for firms in several key sectors of the Northern Irish economy.

"While these latest figures are encouraging compared to the UK average, firms in several key sectors of Northern Ireland’s economy still face significant challenges in the months ahead."