Small business failures rising
Small‑business failures are climbing, with recent coverage showing deteriorating conditions that predate current Middle East shocks—lenders face growing demand for fast onboarding, scenario-based credit and treasury integration to keep SMBs afloat. That trend increases pressure on working‑capital lenders to speed decisions and diversify collateral models. (armidaleexpress.com.au)
ASIC reported more than 11,000 companies entered external administration in 2023–24, the highest annual total in recent years. (asic.gov.au) The Reserve Bank of Australia found over three‑quarters of the recent insolvencies were firms with fewer than 20 employees, and around 20% of insolvencies were restructures rather than straight liquidations. (rba.gov.au) nCino says its cloud banking OS now supports more than 1,850 financial institutions and highlights streamlining of loan origination and onboarding as a primary route to approve more viable small borrowers faster. (thesiliconreview.com) Major technology vendors are moving to consolidate origination, servicing and treasury: FIS launched a cloud‑native Treasury and Risk Manager (Quantum Cloud) and promotes an end‑to‑end Asset Finance platform covering origination, servicing, collections and remarketing. (hostmerchantservices.com) Corporate treasury fragmentation is tying up working capital—an Adyen/BCG study found the average enterprise manages five to six banking relationships and more than 40 bank accounts—while fintechs are embedding instant working‑capital products into payment and accounting flows. (ctmfile.com) Automotive floorplan pressure is visible: one industry brief recorded U.S. new‑vehicle inventory at about 2.97 million units (88 days’ supply) in November 2025 and broader data showed total U.S. inventory near 2.89 million vehicles at the end of 2024, increasing reliance on floorplan lines and raising monitoring needs for inventory‑to‑loan ratios. (harneypartners.com) Solifi’s recent product updates and customer rollouts emphasize faster origination and richer asset data integration—releases include XML asset upload, expanded APIs and originations features targeted at equipment and automotive lenders, and customer stories highlight deployments with equipment‑finance and captive auto lenders. (magazine.factoring.org)
