Deloitte considers turning itself into single partnership
By
Andrew Parker in New York
Published:
By
Andrew Parker in
|
|
The
head of Deloitte, the world's second biggest accounting firm, has predicted it
could transform itself into a single global partnership during the next 10 years.
William Parrett, global chief executive of Deloitte, said regulators were likely
to push the top accounting firms into becoming single partnerships, and that
clients and investors might support what would be an enormous change to existing
structures. Deloitte will tomorrow publish its strategy for the next decade. It
will warn its partners to be prepared to adopt new business structures. If the
big accounting firms were to become single global partnerships, their leaders
would be able to exercise greater authority to drive up standards of audit work.
However, laws in many countries prohibit accounting firms from organising
themselves as single partnerships. Instead, the firms consist of networks of
member partnerships that are formed in the countries in which they operate.
The
partnerships enjoy considerable autonomy. Regulators are increasingly
questioning whether the federation-style structures can deliver consistent audit
work across countries. Mr Parrett, chief executive of Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu,
the firm's global umbrella organisation, said: "My expectation, both from a
business standpoint and a regulatory standpoint, is larger firms will evolve to
a global partnership over the next decade." Deloitte's 10-year strategy
plan says its vision is "to be the standard of excellence", and will
involve raising audit quality. The strategy says the interests of Deloitte's
member partnerships are best served by its existing structure, and Mr Parrett
said the structure should not impede efforts to improve the quality of the
firm's services. But he added: "One could argue it is harder to do it in
this structure, and therefore more costly." The strategy involves scenario
planning for potential changes confronting Deloitte during the next decade,
including the possibility that regulators will push the big firms into becoming
single global partnerships. Mr Parrett said one condition for this would be
liability reform in certain countries to prevent catastrophic legal claims
against firms. Deloitte's annual report, to be released tomorrow, says its
global revenues increased 10.9 per cent to $18.2bn (œ10.4bn) in the fiscal year
ending
Tilbage til forsiden
Back
to the front page