Late payments plague 83% of Central and Eastern European suppliers

While 54% of B2B transactions in the region still occur at the point of sale, the remaining 46% conducted on credit are under significant strain. Six out of ten companies identify customer liquidity shortages as the primary driver behind these delays. Silvia Ungaro, Senior Advisor on B2B payment trends at Atradius, notes that sticky inflation and rising operational costs are compressing margins and widening the liquidity gap across the region.

This financial squeeze manifests in four critical ways for working capital: diminished liquidity headroom, erratic cash flow planning, increased reliance on external financing, and stalled long-term investments. As firms lean on trade credit to sustain sales, they face the compounding burden of higher borrowing costs. Ungaro warns that this creates a self-reinforcing cycle of pressure, where the necessity for external funding grows just as access to that capital becomes more expensive, potentially deepening the economic constraints on businesses throughout the region.