Fifty-five per cent of large and medium sized businesses are expecting a substantial revenue drop this year due to the coronavirus outbreak, according to the results of a new poll.

Commissioned by global private equity provider, Leonne International, the poll quizzed 200 senior business decision makers on the Government’s response to the Covid-19 crisis, and showed that 52% agreed the Government was doing enough to help companies tackle the crisis, although 48% were in disagreement.

Leonne International highlighted that polling was conducted between Wednesday 18 March and Thursday 19 March – after the Chancellor’s announcement of a £330bn package to support businesses to cope with the outbreak.

On top of the 55% of businesses who were expecting a substantial revenue drop, another 28% suggested they were now actively planning to make redundancies to survive the crisis.

Furthermore, 56% of business chiefs said they were predicting an economic crash “worse than 2008” while another 40% expected a major house price crash this year, as a knock-on effect of the outbreak.

Leonne International CEO, Michael Haston, commented: “It’s clear that the Chancellor’s swift and decisive action has provided much needed support to business leaders, despite the huge disruption caused by Covid-19.

“With millions of jobs at stake and tens of thousands of businesses seeing a sharp decline in revenue, it’s essential that the Government stands squarely behind British businesses to help them through this crisis.

“However, there needs to be a much more concerted effort within the wider business community to help companies get access to the financial and support they need to avoid layoffs. It’s also critical that banks and financial services providers do everything in their power to help companies get access to the credit they need.”

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