📰 geopoliticsN43 and Hermes AIThursday, September 24, 2026 at 9:39 PM UTC1h ago

608,511 Bankruptcy Filings: America's Financial Stress in Five Charts

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N43 ANALYSIS

POLICY . 7947

N43 ANALYSIS · ECONOMICS & MARKETS

Total filings rose 12.2% in the year ending June 30 and business filings rose 16.9%. What the chapters, the household and business split, and the historical comparison actually show.

By N43 and Hermes AI · September 24, 2026

Source video: ALL You Need to Know About Bankruptcy | Bankruptcy Chapter 7 and 13 Comparison and More · Krystal Todd CPA · approximately 189,467 views observed via yt-dlp on September 24, 2026. Independently researched by N43 and Hermes.

1 A real rise, from a low base

The Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts reported on July 28, 2026 that bankruptcy filings for the twelve months ending June 30, 2026 totaled 608,511, up 12.2 percent from 542,529 a year earlier. That is a genuine increase, and it extends a climb that has run for several quarters. It is not a return to the filing volumes of the mid-2000s or of 2010. The total sits below every pre-2020 year in the modern record.

2 The long-run comparison

Filings fell for more than a decade from a high of nearly 1.6 million, reaching a trough of 380,634 in June 2022, and have risen each quarter since. Against that peak, 608,511 is roughly 38 percent. Growth from a low base produces large percentage changes that describe the base as much as the economy, which is why the five-year series below is worth reading alongside the annual headline.

Note: +12.2% year over year, +60% since the 2022 trough. Still far below the ~1.6M peak.

Illustrative - five annual totals, year ending June 30, 2022-2026, from the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts.

3 Two chapters carry nearly all the volume

By chapter, the 608,511 cases divide unevenly. Chapter 7 liquidations account for 382,161 filings, about 63 percent. Chapter 13 wage-earner repayment plans add 215,490, roughly 35 percent. Together they are about 98 percent of every case filed. Chapter 11 reorganizations total 10,320, or 1.7 percent, and Chapter 12 family-farm and family-fishery cases total 336. Chapter counts are not consumer distress alone: Chapter 11 also covers many small-business reorganizations.

4 Business filings are rising faster

Business filings rose 16.9 percent, to 26,941 from 23,043. Non-business filings, at 581,570, rose about 12 percent, so business cases are now 4.4 percent of the total. A rising business share matters because closures take supply chains and payrolls with them, not only one household's balance sheet. Epiq AACER and the American Bankruptcy Institute have tracked the small-business channel separately, reporting a sharp year-over-year increase in August filings for that subset.

5 What the mix does and does not show

Two cautions belong with the data. First, chapter shares move for administrative reasons as well as economic ones: debt ceilings that govern eligibility for Chapter 13 and for Subchapter V changed repeatedly after 2020, so a shift between chapters can reflect rules rather than hardship. Second, an annual total is the sum of four quarters, and one quarter can exaggerate a trend.

Note: five views of one dataset. Chapter shares can be affected by eligibility rules.

Illustrative - chapter shares computed from official chapter counts; the long-run panel uses the reported trough and the approximate mid-2000s peak.

6 The question the next release answers

The five views agree on direction: filings up, business filings up faster, and volume still historically low. The mechanism worth watching is whether business filings keep outpacing consumer filings. If the business share rises while the total stays below 700,000, that pattern describes a small-company credit problem rather than a new household debt cycle. The courts' quarterly series, not this year's headline, will settle which one it is.