UK report /North West /St. Helens
DueLead Pulse · Q3 2026

St. Helens business borrowing report

13.8% of St. Helens's 3,199 trading companies have secured borrowing (441 businesses), below the North West at 14.6%.

Covers 2026-07-01 to 2026-09-30 · Companies House file of 2026-10-01 · Free to cite with a link

Share of trading companies with secured borrowing

North West
14.6%
428,393 companies · 8th of 12
12.3%17.4%
3.2k
Trading companies
3,199
13.8%
With secured borrowing
-0.8 pts vs region
1k
Live charges registered
2.4 per borrower
162
New companies in Q3 2026
still trading at quarter end
5.1%
Late filing accounts
163 companies
In brief

What the data says

01Real estate & lettings is the most secured-borrowing sector here: 47% of its 324 companies have a lender's charge.
02162 new companies started in St. Helens in Q3 2026, and 163 (5.1%) are late filing accounts.
Who borrows

Bigger and older companies borrow more

Share of trading companies in St. Helens with at least one outstanding charge, by size (from the accounts they file) and by age.

By company size

Dashed line: North West overall

Micro
9.5%
Small
22.5%
Medium & large
76.1%
No accounts yet
4.4%

By company age

Dashed line: North West overall

0-2 years
4.8%
2-5 years
12.6%
5-10 years
14.9%
10-20 years
21.0%
20+ years
49.7%
By sector

Where secured lending is concentrated

The largest sectors in St. Helens, ranked by the share of companies with a lender's charge.

Real estate & lettings
47.2%
Manufacturing
21.7%
Retail
17.2%
Professional services
6.8%
Construction & trades
5.9%
Personal services
4.2%
Restaurants, pubs & cafes
2.8%
Haulage & logistics
2.7%
Share with secured borrowingAll sectors in St. Helens (13.8%)
Town reports

Other towns in the North West

Every town with at least 2,000 trading companies registered there.

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How we built this report

Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. You're welcome to quote and chart these figures with a link to this page.