Hertz, One Of The Largest Car Rental Company In The World, Files For Bankruptcy

With the coronavirus shutting every form of business and industry around the world, one of the industries that have dealt a hard blow is the travel industry. With travel being completely prohibited in order to help curb the spread of the disease, one such company is in trouble. Hertz, the long-running car-rental company in the U.S. has reportedly been in a critical financial condition earlier this month, citing a 73 percent drop in shares over the past three months and has now filed for bankruptcy.The company will continue to operate while restructuring its debts and its international operations in Australia, New Zealand and Europe will be unaffected. Chapter 11 court protection will allow Hertz to operate while it conceives a plan to turn around the business while paying its debts. The petition listed IBM Corp. and Lyft Inc. as its biggest creditors, while assets and debts are at $25.8 billion and $24.4 billion, respectively.Hertz has listed 567,600 vehicles in its U.S. fleet on its employ last year, all or majority of which are either bought or leased – far from the usual buyback agreement with automakers. Hertz has described this pandemic as “a rapid, sudden and dramatic” blow. The sudden grounding of all business travelers and tourists made it difficult for the company to make good its debts.