Romanian Business Registrations Surge 27.7% in January 2026, But Exit Activity Rises Even Faster
Bucharest, February 2026 — Romania opened 2026 with a sharp acceleration in new business registrations, recording 11,075 new entities in January — a 27.7% increase compared to the 8,675 registrations logged in January 2025 . While the headline growth figure signals robust entrepreneurial momentum entering the new year, a parallel and equally significant rise in business closures and dissolutions adds an important layer of complexity to the overall picture.
A January Rebound Above the Trend Line
January traditionally marks one of the strongest months for new business formation in Romania. Entrepreneurs who deliberate over year-end decisions tend to formalise their plans at the start of a new calendar year, creating a reliable seasonal uptick. The 2026 figure of 11,075 registrations, however, comfortably exceeds what recent trend data would suggest: the 12-month moving average through January 2026 stands at 12,990 registrations per month , meaning January came in below the trailing average — but the year-over-year gain of 2,400 new businesses is substantial by any measure.
The PFA Phenomenon: Self-Employment Surges
The most dramatic structural shift in January 2026 lies within the composition of new registrations. Persoane Fizice Autorizate (PFA) — the self-employed/sole trader category — nearly doubled year-over-year, rising 92.1% from 2,319 in January 2025 to 4,455 in January 2026 . This single category accounts for the lion’s share of the overall registration increase, adding 2,136 new entries compared to a year ago.
By contrast, SRL (the standard limited liability company), which remains the dominant entity type with 6,264 registrations , grew at a far more measured pace of 4.5% year-over-year. The divergence between these two entity types is notable: the PFA surge suggests a wave of individual workers and freelancers formalising their activity, rather than a broad-based expansion in incorporated business formation.
Individual Întreprinderi (II), the sole proprietorship with employees category, posted a modest decline of 6.1% (from 326 to 306), while smaller and less common entity types such as Cooperative Agricole (CA, +166.7%) and SA (joint stock companies, +100%) recorded eye-catching percentage gains — though their absolute volumes remain negligible.
Industry Leaders: Transport and Tech Drive Growth
The sectoral breakdown reveals which parts of the economy attracted the most new entrants in January 2026.
Transport și depozitare (Transport & Storage) claimed the top spot with 2,045 new registrations , displacing the perennial leader Comerț (Trade & Retail), which ranked second at 1,646 registrations. The transport sector grew 45.3% year-over-year , a substantial jump consistent with continued growth in Romania’s logistics and road freight sector, which has been expanding in tandem with cross-border e-commerce flows and infrastructure investment.
Informații și comunicații (IT & Communications) posted the strongest growth among the top sectors, surging 65.9% from 687 to 1,140 registrations . This aligns with the PFA surge — technology freelancers and consultants routinely use the PFA legal form, suggesting that a significant portion of both trends may reflect the same underlying shift toward self-employed tech work.
Activități de spectacole, culturale, sportive și recreative (Arts, Entertainment & Recreation) nearly doubled, rising 96.3% year-over-year , and Industria prelucrătoare (Manufacturing) also posted a striking 94.8% increase . Both categories started from a relatively modest base in January 2025, which amplifies the percentage swings.
Activități profesionale, științifice și tehnice (Professional, Scientific & Technical Activities) grew 37.0% to 1,085 registrations, while Construcții (Construction) was essentially flat at 914 registrations (+0.3%), reflecting a sector where seasonality heavily suppresses January activity.
The one sector to register a decline was Sănătate și asistență socială (Health & Social Care), which fell 12.3% from 227 to 199 registrations — a notable softening in a sector that had attracted considerable new entrants during and after the pandemic period.
Business Exits: A Rising Tide of Closures
The growth in new registrations must be read alongside a significant escalation in business exits. January 2026 recorded a total of 13,761 business exit events , comprising:
- Deregistrations: 6,312 — essentially flat year-over-year (-0.24%)
- Dissolutions: 5,403 — up 51.6% from 3,564 in January 2025
- Suspensions: 2,046 — up 19.9% from 1,706
The most significant concern is the dissolution figure. A 51.6% year-over-year rise in formal company dissolutions — where shareholders or courts initiate the legal winding-up of an entity — is a meaningful signal that goes beyond seasonal noise. Unlike deregistrations, which can reflect administrative tidying of dormant entities, dissolutions typically represent active decisions to close a business.
The resulting churn rate of 124.25% means exits significantly outnumber new registrations in January 2026 — a situation also seen in January 2025, where exits totalled 11,597 against 8,675 registrations. The net business growth stands at -2,686 for the month , though this is a marginal improvement over January 2025’s net position of -2,922 .
The health ratio — registrations as a proportion of exits — improved to 0.80 from 0.75 in January 2025 , indicating a mild improvement in the balance between entries and exits despite the elevated absolute volumes on both sides.
Regional Patterns: Bucharest and Its Suburbs Lead
Geographically, the registration surge was concentrated in Romania’s largest urban centres. București recorded 2,706 new registrations in January 2026 , a remarkable 54.8% increase over January 2025’s 1,748 . The adjacent Ilfov county similarly surged 53.0% to 696 registrations, reflecting continued suburban expansion around the capital.
Galați posted the highest percentage growth of any county included in the top-growth ranking, rising 119.3% year-over-year from 119 to 261 registrations — a striking figure for a traditionally industrial city, potentially linked to manufacturing and logistics activity along the Danube corridor.
Constanța (+59.6%), Brașov (+54.8%), and Cluj (+35.2%) also posted strong gains, confirming that growth was broadly distributed across Romania’s secondary urban hubs rather than being exclusively a capital-city story. Iași, the largest city in Moldova, grew at a more measured 14.8%.
Context and Interpretation
Several factors help contextualise the January 2026 data.
The PFA-driven surge is arguably the most important structural story. Romanian labour law and tax policy have periodically incentivised formalisation of self-employment, and the near-doubling of PFA registrations in a single month — particularly in the technology and transport sectors — may reflect continued migration from informal arrangements or salaried employment toward freelance structures.
The sharp rise in dissolutions is worth monitoring carefully. January is historically a period when companies finalised the prior year’s accounts decide to wind down underperforming entities rather than file another year of statutory obligations. A 51.6% jump in dissolutions year-over-year, however, is above what seasonal patterns alone would predict and may point to a broader rationalisation of the business landscape following a challenging operating environment.
The combination of these two trends — more individual operators entering the market, and more incorporated companies exiting it — could reflect a structural shift in how economic activity is being organised: away from incorporated SMEs and toward self-employed individuals, a pattern observed across several Central and Eastern European economies in recent years.
The 12-month moving average of 12,990 registrations per month remains above January’s actual figure of 11,075, consistent with the typical January seasonal dip relative to busier spring and autumn months.
Summary
January 2026 presents a nuanced picture of Romania’s business landscape. New registrations grew at the fastest year-over-year rate in recent memory for this month, driven overwhelmingly by a surge in sole trader (PFA) formations and buoyed by strong activity in transport, technology, and professional services. Urban centres — particularly Bucharest, Ilfov, and Constanța — led the charge geographically.
At the same time, the simultaneous spike in business dissolutions is a counterweight that tempers an overly optimistic reading. The business ecosystem remains in net negative territory, with exits outpacing entries, though the gap narrowed slightly compared to a year ago. Whether the PFA boom represents durable entrepreneurial growth or a structural reclassification of labour will be one of the key questions to track as 2026 progresses.