As many as 200,000 businesses may have taken loans from the Mafia to stay in business, according to a report issued by the Italian business organization, Confesercenti, working with the Sicily-based anti-Mafia group SOS Impresa. It claimed that the Mafia had now become Italy's main source of loans to small and medium-sized businesses.
According to the report, organized crime has an annual turnover of 140 billion euros ($178.9 billion) of which 100 billion euros is profit. The liquidity of various criminal groups is now financing Italy's small businesses as banks have stopped lending to them.
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