## 3 Results  
To understand the economic sustainability of this sector, we analyze a set of financial indicators, namely from the group of profitability, liquidity, indebtedness, firm's growth, and efficiency. Table 3 present the descriptive statistics of the ratios calculated, namely mean, standard deviation, minimum and maximum. As the sample is an unbalanced data sample, the number of observations is different, as not always there was enough information to calculate all financial ratios. According to Table 3, Portugal firms have, in mean, 10.45 years old, being the younger with 0 years (created in the year of analysis) and the oldest with 39 years. This fact suggests that most firms in this sector are young and recently created. Return on assets (ROA) is in mean positive (0.02), meaning that firms are efficient in managing their investments. However, not all firms have profits, which explain the minimum value of ROA (\(-\)2.01). Regarding ROE is also positive in mean (0.11), but there is great dispersion among the sample. The maximum value (ROE = 21.50) is a false positive since the firm has both net income and total equity negative, which means that not only present losses, but it is also in technical bankruptcy. Other firms present negative net income (as shown in Table 2), and therefore a negative ROE. The current ratio is higher than the unity, suggesting that firms can pay their short-term debts with their current assets. The dispersion among the sample is high, showing great dispersion among firms. The firm's indebtedness is, in mean, high (90.13%), meaning that liabilities are the main source to finance the firm's investment (only 10% is equity--own source). This adds additional costs and risks to firms, which in turn decreases their solvency. While some firms do not present liabilities, others are to indebtedness since the maximum value is 4717.80%, indicating that liabilities not only cover total investment (assets) but also the negative equity. Sales growth is positive (SG = 23.85% in mean), which proves that this sector is growing. Once again, the dispersion among the sample is huge, with some firms with a decrease in sales and others with a great increase. Finally, per unit of sales, firms contribute 0.42 to GDP, which confirms its contribution to the Portuguese economy as well as the firm's efficiency. However, not all firms contribute to the country's economic growth (minimum value is negative). \begin{table}
\begin{tabular}{l c c c c c} \hline \hline
**Variable** & **Obs** & **Mean** & **Std. Dev.** & **Min** & **Max** \\ \hline
**Panel A: Portugal** & & & & & \\ Age & 173 & 10.45 & 8.89 & 0.00 & 39.00 \\ ROA & 173 & 0.02 & 0.24 & \(-\)2.01 & 0.69 \\ ROE & 173 & 0.11 & 2.27 & \(-\)16.04 & 21.50 \\ _Current Ratio_ & 165 & 6.63 & 21.63 & \(-\)18.80 & 223.95 \\ Debt Ratio (\%) & 173 & 90.13 & 359.39 & 0.00 & 4717.80 \\ Sales Growth (\%) & 145 & 23.85 & 112.63 & \(-\)100.00 & 725.75 \\ VAR & 151 & 0.42 & 0.87 & \(-\)9.12 & 1.36 \\ \hline
**Panel B: Spain** & & & & & \\ Age & 646 & 14.10 & 10.35 & 0.00 & 57.00 \\ ROA & 646 & \(-\)0.03 & 1.51 & \(-\)33.00 & 1.30 \\ ROE & 646 & \(-\)0.06 & 7.78 & \(-\)179.64 & 66.60 \\ _Current Ratio_ & 640 & 95.70 & 2176.58 & 0.00 & 55,019.52 \\ Debt Ratio (\%) & 646 & 65.66 & 134.64 & 0.00 & 3063.71 \\ Sales Growth (\%) & 583 & 38.10 & 277.87 & \(-\)96.47 & 5727.93 \\ VAR & 622 & 0.62 & 1.47 & \(-\)6.87 & 32.47 \\ \hline \hline \end{tabular} ROA: return on assets; ROE: return on equity; VAR: value-added ratio. Source: own analysis in IBM SPSS version 27.  
\end{table} 
Table 3: Financial statistics. In Spain, in mean firms have 14.10 years old, with the oldest one with 57 years, and some were created during the period analyzed. Even if in mean net income is positive, there are huge differences among the sample, which impact profitability ratios. Both ratios of profitability (ROA and ROE) are in mean negative.