Bankruptcies aren’t just rising — they’re suddenly everywhere.
From billion-dollar giants to mom-and-pop shops to everyday individuals, bankruptcies are piling up across the US this year, with large corporate bankruptcies already hitting their highest level in 15 years.
The surge in bankruptcies highlights the growing financial pressures facing consumers and companies as costs climb amid a tougher borrowing environment.
“Rising costs, tighter credit conditions, and ongoing geopolitical volatility continue to exert pressure on households and businesses already facing financial strain,” Amy Quackenboss, the executive director at the American Bankruptcy Institute, said earlier this month.
Unlike past downturns, this wave of bankruptcies appears to be hitting nearly every corner of the economy. It’s sweeping across a range of sectors in what one veteran bankruptcy attorney described as a strikingly “unusual” pattern.
A wide cross-section of industries
Typically, corporate failures tend to be “industry sticky,” meaning they cluster within the same sectors, Robert Stark, a partner at the law firm Brown Rudnick and chair of its bankruptcy and corporate restructuring practice group, recently told Business Insider.
In 2022, for example, he said there was the “big crypto winter” culminating in a string of cryptocurrency firm bankruptcies, including Sam Bankman-Fried’s FTX.
“That was a sticky event — a lot in the industry kind of went through bankruptcy at the same time,” Stark said. “What we have now, which is the thing that I find kind of interesting, is I don’t see as much stickiness as I’m used to seeing.”
“Bankruptcies seem to be kind of all over the place,” added Stark, who represents creditor groups in the 2025 bankruptcies of auto parts company First Brands and fintech startup Linqto, as well as the equity committee in the Chapter 11 case of genetic testing company 23andMe.
Stark said that he can’t pinpoint a clear cause for the “broad smattering of industries” now in bankruptcy, but he called it “unusual” in his 30 years of experience and “shockingly so.”
High-profile bankruptcies
Major corporate bankruptcies this year have included hospitality company Sonder, Spirit Airlines, Del Monte Foods, retailer Claire’s, and CVS Health subsidiary Omnicare. Each, in court filings, listed more than $1 billion in liabilities, placing them among the largest bankruptcies of 2025.
According to data from S&P Global Market Intelligence, which tracks public and private companies of a certain size, bankruptcy filings climbed to 717 through November, topping last year’s tally of 687.
Even without December figures, 2025 has already logged the highest annual count for large corporate bankruptcies since 2010, when filings totaled 828, according to S&P Global.
Data from the intelligence firm shows that the industrials sector was the most distressed through November, with 110 companies filing for bankruptcy. The consumer discretionary sector followed with 85 bankruptcy filings, and healthcare was next up with 46 firms filing.
Small business bankruptcies
The spike in bankruptcies extends well beyond the corporate sphere, with an increasing number of small businesses also filing for bankruptcy, data shows.
Small businesses carrying $3,024,725 or less in secured and unsecured debt have the option to file for bankruptcy under Subchapter V of Chapter 11, which offers a more streamlined reorganization process.
Data from Epiq Bankruptcy Analytics shows Subchapter V filings, made by small firms and individuals, at more than 2,300 year-to-date through mid-December — a nearly 10% increase from the same period last year.
In November alone, Subchapter V bankruptcy filings totaled 223 — a 23% bump from the previous year, according to the American Bankruptcy Institute, which cited data from Epiq.
Personal bankruptcies
In addition to big and small businesses, individual bankruptcies have also increased amid rising costs.
Individual bankruptcy filings saw an 8% jump to 40,973 in November 2025, up from the 37,814 filings in November 2024, the data cited by ABI shows.
Last month, there were 25,329 individual filings for Chapter 7, known as “clean slate” or liquidation bankruptcy, up 11% from the 22,871 filings recorded in November 2024.
Individual filings for Chapter 13, also called a “wage earner’s plan” to repay all or part of someone’s debts, accounted for 15,558 in November 2025, a 5% jump over the 14,865 filings in November last year, according to the data cited by ABI.
“For debt-burdened families and companies, bankruptcy remains a critical pathway to restore stability and rebuild toward a stronger financial future,” Quackenboss, the ABI executive director, said.
