Deloitte gets a boost from high revenues
DELOITTE, the world’s largest accounting and consulting firm, said global revenue rose the most in three years in the 2011 fiscal year, helped by double-digit gains in advisory and consulting work.
Deloitte’s member firms worldwide reported a record $28.8bn (£18.8bn) in revenue, up 8.4 per cent from 2010. In local currency terms, not accounting for fluctuations in the value of the dollar, revenue grew 7.7 per cent for the fiscal year that ended 31 May.
Deloitte will likely post similar growth in fiscal 2012, despite a challenging economic picture, the firm’s global chief executive, Barry Salzberg, said yesterday.
“Our first quarter [fiscal 2012] results are very much in line with what we’ve achieved in the prior year,” Salzberg said.
Deloitte also said it plans to boost its workforce 37 per cent to 250,000 by fiscal year 2015, up from 182,000 currently.
The Asia-Pacific region was the fastest-growing area for a seventh straight year, with revenue growth of more than 25 per cent at member firms in Australia and India, Deloitte said.
Deloitte’s growth came in a year when the global services sector posted an uneven rebound from a 2008-2009 slump. Deloitte’s results may bode well for the other “Big Four” global accounting and consulting firms — Ernst & Young, KPMG and PwC — expected to report revenues in the coming months.
Financial advisory work led Deloitte’s revenue growth, with a 15.1 per cent rise, followed by a 14.9 per cent jump in consulting revenue. Revenue from tax services grew 5.2 per cent, while audit and enterprise risk services rose 4.7 per cent.
A jump in consulting revenues had helped Deloitte edge past PwC in total revenues in 2010 to claim the top spot among the Big Four firms by a margin of just $9m.