Abbreviated accounts and micro-companies: what you can read about a client

In short: abbreviated accounts contain a simplified balance sheet and income statement and reduced notes to the accounts, without a cash flow statement. Those of micro-companies are even leaner and may not have notes at all. You do not see separate receivables from customers or payables to banks, but net equity, liquidity, total receivables and payables, revenues, costs and profit remain readable.

The current thresholds: who can use abbreviated accounts and who is a micro-company

A company may prepare its accounts in abbreviated form if it has no securities traded on regulated markets and if, in the first financial year or then for two consecutive financial years, it has not exceeded two of the three limits of art. 2435-bis c.c. Micro-companies are companies that, under the same rule, do not exceed two of the three limits of art. 2435-ter c.c. These are the values in the current text.

The asset and revenue limits were raised by art. 16 of Legislative Decree (D.Lgs.) of 6 September 2024, no. 125, in force from 25 September 2024, which implements the delegated directive (EU) 2023/2775 on adjusting the size criteria. The decree does not state in its text a specific date from which the new thresholds apply; according to commentators (for example MySolution, 21 March 2025) they apply to financial years starting from 1 January 2024. For assessing a client this question is secondary: the form the company has chosen is visible in the filed accounts.

If the company exceeds two of the limits for the second consecutive financial year, it must return to the ordinary accounts (or to the abbreviated ones, if it was a micro-company).

What is missing compared with the ordinary accounts

In the abbreviated accounts

• Condensed balance sheet: it includes only the items of art. 2424 marked with capital letters and Roman numerals. So you see the total of receivables (C.II) and the total of payables (D), but not how much is owed by customers or how much to banks and suppliers. The obligation to show separately the receivables and payables due beyond the next financial year remains.
• Income statement with some groupings: art. 2435-bis allows some sub-items to be combined, for example the three items for depreciation and write-downs of fixed assets (B10 a, b, c) or some items of personnel costs (B9 c, d, e).
• No cash flow statement: the law expressly exempts those who prepare abbreviated accounts.
• Reduced notes to the accounts (nota integrativa): only some points of art. 2427 remain, including debts secured by collateral, off-balance-sheet commitments, transactions with related parties and significant events after the year end.
• Optional directors' report: it is not required if the notes to the accounts report the information in items 3 and 4 of art. 2428 (treasury shares and shares or quotas of parent companies held, purchased or sold).
• Simpler valuation criteria: the company may record securities at purchase cost, receivables at estimated realisable value and payables at nominal value.

In the micro-company accounts

Layouts and criteria are those of the abbreviated accounts, but art. 2435-ter exempts micro-companies from the cash flow statement, the directors' report and the notes to the accounts, on condition that at the foot of the balance sheet the commitments, guarantees and contingent liabilities, and the fees, advances and loans granted to directors and statutory auditors, are shown. Those few lines at the bottom of the balance sheet must therefore be read carefully.

What you can still obtain

Even with abbreviated accounts you have enough figures to get an idea of a client's solidity:

• Net equity (liabilities item A), with capital, reserves and profit or loss: it is the basis for understanding whether capital has been eroded. The legal thresholds are explained in the guide on how to tell from the accounts whether a supplier is about to fail.
• Cash and cash equivalents (C.IV) and inventories (C.I): together with receivables and payables due within the year they are enough for an estimate of the liquidity ratios.
• Total receivables (C.II) compared with two years of revenues: if receivables grow faster than revenues, the client is collecting more slowly.
• Total payables (D) and the portion due beyond the next financial year: they show how heavy the debt is and how much falls due within a year, but not how much of it is financial debt. The net financial position cannot be calculated from the abbreviated balance sheet alone.
• Almost complete income statement: revenues, costs for raw materials, services and personnel, depreciation, interest expense (C.17) and result. They are enough to estimate the operating margin (EBITDA, known in Italian as MOL, gross operating margin): see the guide on EBITDA and MOL of a client.

What is mainly missing is the financial side: without the cash flow statement and the breakdown of payables it is hard to understand how much cash the client generates and how much it owes to banks, and therefore to calculate an indicator such as the DSCR. If the amount you are about to extend is significant, ask for recent management accounts or for the breakdown of payables. What to do with cash flows when the cash flow statement is missing is explained in the guide on the cash flow statement.

Partnerships and sole proprietorships: no filed accounts

The obligation to file the accounts with the Companies Register within thirty days of approval applies to joint-stock companies: art. 2435 c.c. for S.p.A., referred to by art. 2478-bis c.c. for S.r.l. For partnerships, as the commentary on art. 2435 on Brocardi.it points out, only the preparation of an annual statement is required, and it must not be filed or published. Neither a general partnership (S.n.c.) nor a limited partnership (S.a.s.), nor a sole proprietorship (ditta individuale), which is not a company, therefore has filed accounts to consult.

In these cases the assessment shifts to other data: how long the business has existed, protests and insolvency proceedings, who runs it, how it behaves in payments, and a first structured order to limit the risk. The method is explained in the guide on how to assess a company without filed accounts. For protests and insolvency proceedings there is also the single check at 5.90€ on /verifica-veloce.

How to proceed, in practice

1. Look at the form of the filed accounts: full, abbreviated or micro-company.
2. Read net equity, liquidity, total receivables and payables and their portion due beyond the year.
3. Compare at least two financial years: a single year does not tell you in which direction the company is heading.
4. Read the reduced notes to the accounts, or the lines at the foot of the balance sheet if it is a micro-company.
5. If the amount is important, ask for the data that the simplified accounts do not show.

The full route is in the practical guide to reading a client's or supplier's accounts; for the details to look for in the text, see the guide on the notes to the accounts (nota integrativa).

Sources

• Art. 2435-bis c.c., Abbreviated-form accounts, current text (Brocardi.it) (accessed 2026-11-01)
• Art. 2435-ter c.c., Micro-company accounts, current text (Brocardi.it) (accessed 2026-11-01)
• Legislative Decree of 6 September 2024, no. 125, art. 16 (Normattiva) (accessed 2026-11-01)
• Legislative Decree of 6 September 2024, no. 125, art. 17 (Normattiva) (accessed 2026-11-01)
• MySolution, Abbreviated accounts and micro-companies with new size thresholds from 2024 (2025-03-21) (accessed 2026-11-01)
• Art. 2424 c.c., Contents of the balance sheet (Brocardi.it) (accessed 2026-11-01)
• Art. 2435 c.c., Filing of the accounts, with commentary (Brocardi.it) (accessed 2026-11-01)
• Art. 2428 c.c., Directors' report (Brocardi.it) (accessed 2026-11-01)
• Art. 2478-bis c.c., Accounts and distribution of profits to members (Brocardi.it) (accessed 2026-11-01)