As we officially head into the second month of living in a global pandemic, the key question on most investors’ minds remains the same today as it was back in March: which companies will remain resilient during this time of adversity, and which companies will crumble under the pressure? In this report, we discuss a variety of datasets that we believe help indicate corporate health and, in turn, financial distress.

Taking inspiration from a 2018 literature review on the determinants of financial distress, the report will specifically touch on alternative datasets that shed light on:

• Operational activity
• Corporate activity
• Credit and capital structures

While the majority of datasets mentioned are targeted at equity investors, we believe that this report can also have applications for macro investors (e.g for gauging business activity/health in a given country).