One in five businesses to re-open next month

The Office for National Statistics has issued its latest Covid-19 economic indicators linked to the coronavirus outbreak.

Here are some of the main stats from surveys collected earlier this month, laying bare the cash squeeze many businesses are facing:

• 42% of responding businesses had less than six months of cash reserves
• 4% of responding businesses had no cash reserves
• 79% of responding businesses had applied for the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme. Around 27% of the workforce in these businesses had been furloughed

Some businesses that temporarily ceased trading are now reopening:

•  Of businesses who responded as trading, 8% said they had started trading again in the last two weeks
• 24% of businesses who have currently paused trading expect to start trading again in the next four weeks
•  31% expect to start trading in more than 4 weeks’ time