The Financial Reporting Council (FRC) has published the annual trend report for the accounting profession.
This year’s report shows that membership of the various accountancy organisations continues to grow, with nearly 390 thousand members in the UK and Ireland and more than 590 thousand members worldwide. The number of accounting students in the UK also increased by 0.3 percent to 164 thousand in 2021.
The report also looks at trends in the audit market, and it is striking that the next five offices outside the big four have increased their share in the FTSE 350 audit market, from nineteen companies to 24 companies. Improving competition in the FTSE 350 audit market is one of the objectives of the reforms in the UK audit market.
Despite the challenging economic climate, the big four offices still saw their audit revenues increase by 6.5 percent from 2020 to 2021, compared to 7.9 percent from 2019 to 2020. Outside the Big Four, revenues also increased, but growth has slowed considerably; in 19/20, revenues grew by 20.9 percent, in 20/21 by 12.5 percent.
