Corporate bankruptcies are going bigly in 2025. In the 12 months between the second half of 2024 to the first half of 2025, 117 companies with assets over $100 million filed for bankruptcy, a 44% increase over the 20-year average, according to a new report by consulting firm Cornerstone Research.

The jump in “mega bankruptcies”—those filed by companies with over $1 billion in reported assets—was even more stark, growing 33% over the last year alone, marking the highest number of mega bankruptcies in a six-month period since the onset of the pandemic in 2020.

Continued inflation, high interest rates, falling consumer demand, tariffs, and uncertain policy shifts are driving the increase in bankruptcies, especially for companies already struggling, according Matt Osborn, a principal at Cornerstone Research and co-author of the report.

“A number of companies already have weak balance sheets from the prior three years or so under high inflation and interest rates,” Osborn told CFO Dive. “Additional uncertainty regarding the regulatory landscape is more recently layered on top of that so companies that are already weakened by general macroeconomic headwinds are also now citing policy uncertainty.”

Manufacturing was hit particularly hard by policy changes in Washington recently, with “the highest share of bankruptcy filings across all industries,” with 30% of all filings according to the report. Among the manufacturers filing mega bankruptcies, 67% “cited regulatory, legal, and policy landscape as a key financial distress driver.”

Read the story on our website.—DA

Say goodbye to the one piece of government mail we actually like getting.

The IRS is officially ending the use of paper checks for tax refunds this week. It’s the first step of an executive order signed in March by President Trump to broadly transition the department to exclusive use of electronic payments.

The change applies to all taxpayers but will only impact a minority. According to a Sept. 23 news release from the IRS, 93% of individuals already receive their tax refunds via direct deposit.

The IRS cited speed, costs, and decreased risk of theft as key factors for the switch. The announcement from the IRS stated that paper checks are 16 times more likely to be “lost, stolen, altered, or delayed.” It also noted that the electronic refunds are usually delivered to taxpayers within 21 days, versus the six weeks or longer that it takes to receive a check by mail. It should also be cheaper.

What’s next for IRS deposits?—JK

It would be easy to fall into the trap of thinking that Burning Man’s CFO’s KPIs for the arts and creativity festival would involve bonfires and art installations. While attendees might gauge the success of the weeklong cultural event by the size of the burn pile, CFO Juho Parkkinen recently spoke with CFO Brew about measuring costs, why Burning Man is a different type of company, and figuring out pricing.

Leading Indicators is a CFO Brew series on important or interesting KPIs. Is there a unique KPI in your industry you’d like us to know about? Get in touch with us at [email protected].

What is a key metric you keep an eye on?

We measure many things to try to understand how the financial performance is doing, but the cost per attendee is a massive and very helpful metric. On Reddit boards and Facebook, people are very concerned: Why are the ticket prices this much? What am I paying? We provide more information as to “this is the cost of Black Rock City,” and when you divide that by the number of people that show up, this is the cost per participant.

How has that impacted how you price tickets?

What we’re asking is for people to self-identify to the minimum amount that they would give back and allow that city to happen. Managing the actual live ticket sales towards that number is an interesting KPI…But fundamentally, this comes back to being able to articulate the impact around financials.

Keep reading here.—JK

Think of our little crosswords like espresso shots: They go down quick and give you a lift. Test your wits with our Brew Mini crosswords, designed to sharpen your mind in five minutes or less.

Skip the noise and cut to the jobs that matter. CollabWORK curates openings from top employers and shares them directly in trusted spaces like CFO Brew—click here to see the full list for readers like you.