Skip to content

Manufacture of basic metals

NACE 24420 · division 24 Basic metals
Current registrations 60division 24: 597
Starters, 12 months 11.7 per 100 · Belgium 8.9
Employment (FTE) 1,88925 employers · latest accounts
Median age 24.4 yearsBelgium 8.1 years
E-invoicing via Peppol 83.3%50 of 60 companies in the Peppol Directory · Belgium 85.0%

No bankruptcy in the past twelve months.

Filed accounts

NACE 24420 · financial year 2025 · 43 filed annual accounts
Median solvency
36.7%
division 43.8% · Belgium 46.1%
Median net result
€43,995
division €23,098 · Belgium €16,520
Median equity
€1.3m
division €487,439 · Belgium €98,421
Loss-making
32.6%
division 29.6% · Belgium 26.7%
Negative equity
16.3%
division 9.7% · Belgium 12.4%
Median return on equity
5.3%
division 7.5% · Belgium 15.9%
Median liquidity
1.51
division 1.71 · Belgium 1.66
Filed late
23.9%
financial year 2024, 46 filings · division 29.5% · Belgium 38.4%
Missing or 90 days late
4.2%
of 48 companies with annual accounts · division 4.8% · Belgium 5.4%
Per financial year202020212022202320242025
Median solvency 37.6%34.5%43.1%38.8%40.8%36.7%
Median net result €58,293€109,453€77,389€95,004€62,227€43,995

Hold your customer's or competitor's figures against them in the Sector benchmark

Bankruptcies

Bankruptcies, 5 years, still registered
1
1.67% of the registrations · Belgium 1.68%
Running bankruptcies
2
33.3 per 1,000 registrations

Recent bankruptcies

Date Company
16-06-2023 DP4S
BE 0550.421.946

Every bankruptcy in division 24, last 90 days

Spread across the country

by region and province · 57 of 60 enterprises with a registered office on file · a sole trader has no published seat
  • Flanders 42 · 73.7%
  • Wallonia 12 · 21.1%
  • Brussels 2 · 3.5%
  • Abroad 1 · 1.8%
fewer moremax 11

The balance sheets of division 24 on the map, by municipality and down to the address

Largest employers

NACE 24420 as first main activity · staff from the latest accounts
  1. 1 Aluminium DuffelDuffel 893 FTEfinancial year 2025
  2. 2 HYDRO EXTRUSION LICHTERVELDELichtervelde 210 FTEfinancial year 2025
  3. 3 E - MAX ALUMINIUM PROFIELENDilsen-Stokkem 124 FTEfinancial year 2025
  4. 4 SANKYO TATEYAMA EUROPEDuffel 113 FTEfinancial year 2025
  5. 5 Aliplast Aluminium ExtrusionLokeren 96.8 FTEfinancial year 2025

Companies

60 with this main activity

Joint committees

from the latest accounts of 31 companies
  • 111 Metal, mechanical and electrical engineering 16
  • 209 White-collar workers in metal manufacturing 16
  • 105 Non-ferrous metals 7
  • 224 White-collar workers in non-ferrous metals 6
  • 124 Construction 3
  • 200 Auxiliary committee for white-collar workers 3
  • 142.02 Recovery of raw materials 1
  • 149.04 Metal trade 1
Show the 2 others
  • 201 Independent retail 1
  • 219 Technical inspection and conformity assessment 1

Source: the annual accounts at the National Bank. One filing can name more than one committee.

Division 24: Basic metals

Related activities

5 other activities
Activity Registrations Starters, 12 months Bankruptcies, 12 months FTE
Manufacture of basic metals24450 28 1 0 643
Manufacture of basic metals24430 24 0 0 929
Manufacture of basic metals24410 19 0 0 -
Manufacture of basic metals24440 7 0 0 1,189
Manufacture of basic metals24460 3 0 0 22

Bankruptcies per year in division 24

Per year201520162017201820192020202120222023202420252026
Bankruptcies742253364323
Jobs lost651112176131790429521145

2026 through September. Every bankruptcy, also of companies that have since left the register. Source: Statbel (Directorate-General Statistics), NACE classification of 2008.

Staff cost per FTE in NACE division 24

172 employers
Median
€66,900
Belgium €61,400
Middle half
€58,700 to €84,700
half of the employers lie between
Place among sectors
36 of 78
sectors with a median staff cost per FTE, highest first
By size class
SizeMedianMiddle halfEmployers
fewer than 10 FTE €59,500 €49,900 to €72,900 55
10 to 49 FTE €65,000 €59,600 to €73,500 60
50 to 249 FTE €79,600 €67,600 to €88,700 44

Employers with the highest staff cost per FTE in this division All sectors by staff cost In the Analysis workbench

Foreign control in NACE division 24

439 registered companies
Companies with a foreign parent
6.4%
28 of 439; Belgium 0.3%
Staff at those companies
29%
6,437 of 22,016 FTE; Belgium 14%

Main parent countries: Germany (5), Netherlands (5) and France (4).Show on the map by municipality

Subsidies in this sector

per register · legal entities with an enterprise number
  • Flemish subsidies €422.7m awarded 114 recipients · 2022 to 2025 · largest: Subsidie voor bedrijven ter compensatie van indirecte emissiekosten
  • Federal transfers 7.3m amount as published 2 recipients · 2023 to 2025 · largest: Financieringskost nucleaire bijdrage Synatom
  • EU budget €80.5m attributed share 5 recipients · 2022 to 2025 · largest: Innovation Fund
  • EU research €17.8m EU contribution 7 recipients · 2013 to 2027 · largest: Horizon Europe

Explore every recipient in this sector

Insights on Manufacture of basic metals

Balance sheet and result. The median net result of €43,995 is above Belgium's €16,520. Return on equity of 5.3% is below Belgium's 15.9%. 16.3% of the annual accounts show negative equity, against 12.4% in Belgium.

Bankruptcies. The median bankruptcy probability of 0.5% is above Belgium's 0.2%.

Inflow and structure. Half of the companies are younger than 24.4 years, against 8.1 years in Belgium. 5.0% of the companies are sole traders, against 41.6% in Belgium. Flanders holds 75.0% of the seats, against 64.7% in Belgium.

Staff and filing. 23.9% of the financial year 2024 accounts were filed late, against 38.4% in Belgium. The 5 largest employers hold 1,436 of the 1,889 FTE: 76.0%.

Direction. The median net result fell from €58,293 in financial year 2020 to €43,995 in financial year 2025.

The comparison with Belgium as a whole and with the other divisions is as of 06-11-2026 05:30.

Method and sources

Every company registered today counts under its main activities in the KBO. Establishment units do not count. Staff counts once, under the employer's first main activity, from its latest accounts and only where it fits the staff costs. The count follows the NACE 2025 classification, the version in which code 24420 exists.

The bankruptcies over five years count only companies still registered today, because the activity of a company that left the register is not kept. So they are fewer than the bankruptcies of those years, and the figure is not a probability for the future. Over twelve months the count is nearly complete, because a bankrupt company stays registered while its bankruptcy runs. A company with more than one main activity counts in each of those sectors.

The comparison with Belgium as a whole and with the other NACE divisions rests on an overview of every division, counted again each night. Each division is counted in the version of the NACE classification in which it exists. A standing such as "more than in 80%" compares with the other divisions that have the figure. A division's bankruptcy probability is the median over its companies with a score. Belgium here counts the 1,276,581 companies with a main activity, because only those belong to a division. The other 698,987 registrations publish no activity.

Each median is the value of the middle company, computed over the annual accounts of financial year 2025, and is shown only from 30 accounts. A share (loss-making, negative equity) counts that year's accounts with that trait. Accounts are late when they are filed after the statutory deadline. The direction per financial year follows the companies still registered today. Missing or 90 days late counts the companies with accounts missing today, or whose latest were filed more than 90 days after the deadline. The dossier follows the same rule.

We would like to set cookies. That happens only with your consent. What we measure