Keighley has shot up a table of the most profitable towns and cities in Britain.

In a survey carried out this week, Keighley is ranked as the 153rd most profitable town out of 284 towns and cities across the United Kingdom. The new ranking marks a dramatic improvement for Keighley, which has jumped 57 places from its ranking of 210 last year.

The table has been compiled by global solutions company Experian which has used the average profit margins of 235,000 firms across the country to rank towns and cities. It also reveals that during this year, companies in Keighley have an average profit margin of 4.61 per cent.

Bradford was one of the cities to fall down the table with its 5.34 per cent margin this year causing it to drop from 83 in the table to 119. In a list of the 43 English counties, Yorkshire has been ranked 19th with 5.52 per cent.

"All the measures of profitability have shown an improvement over the last year," says Peter Brooker of Experian.

"Of more than 280 towns and cities surveyed, only five suffered an overall financial loss compared with 18 last year, with 154, well over half, increasing their average profit margin on the previous year."

Worthing in East Sussex maintained its crown as the most profitable town in Britain with an increase from 20.90 per cent to 24.71 per cent.

Workington is bottom of the table with a margin of -4.66 per cent.

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