Corporate profitability in the UK has shown no significant improvement in Q4 2002. The year's performance ranked as the worst since 1994, fuelling fears that more UK business failures are in the pipeline, argues Steve Akers, partner within Grant Thornton's Recovery and Reorganisation practice. In figures published today by the Office of National Statistics and analysed by Grant Thornton, the last quarter of 2002 saw a net return of 11 per cent, bringing the yearly average to 11.4 per cent - a nine-year low.
