Grant Thornton announces US$3.8 billion global revenues

22 December 2011

Grant Thornton, the global accounting organisation, has announced combined global revenues of US$3.8 billion from its 108 member firms - a 3.1% increase - for the year ended 30 September 2011.

Assurance services achieved 1.4% growth and, at US$1,712 million, continue to account for around 45% of global revenues. Tax revenues grew to US$833 million, a 2.1% increase on last year. Advisory services grew the most - 3.5% - generating US$922 million and 24% of global revenues.

Ed Nusbaum, CEO of Grant Thornton International, explains, "Despite the continued troubles faced by the global economy, I am delighted that Grant Thornton has achieved growth in 2011 across all regions and service lines and, in some countries, by significant margins. We knew 2011 would be another challenging year but we continued to invest in our global network through mergers and acquisitions. We have an ambition to earn a reputation as the leading business advisers to dynamic organisations by unlocking their potential for growth. In some cases we made tough decisions to replace member firms with organisations more aligned to our strategy and who share our growth ambitions.

"We welcomed 14 new member firms to the global organisation during 2011 in locations of strategic importance to the future of our business – Algeria, Azerbaijan, Czech Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Estonia, Iraq, Kazakhstan, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Senegal, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan – adding a total of around 750 people worldwide.

"As well as expanding our global footprint through new member firms, an important part of our strategy is to grow our global business through mergers and acquisitions and the past year has seen significant merger activity across all continents. In Canada five mergers helped our two firms to impressive overall growth of 17.3% (Grant Thornton LLP) and 12.5% (Raymond Chabot Grant Thornton). In Argentina a merger adding 5 new partners and 72 staff contributed to 24.4% revenue growth. A merger also helped to triple the size of our Austrian firm early in 2011 and at the close of the year we have just announced a merger in Russia that will double the size of our firm. In the Asia Pacific region mergers in Hong Kong and New Zealand have strengthened service offerings. These are just some of the mergers which will fundamentally change our capacity in a number of markets, opening new avenues for growth and client service.”

The Asia Pacific region saw impressive growth of 9%, helped by growth of over 20% in Australia, Malaysia and New Zealand and 19.2% in Vietnam. Growth of 4% in the Americas was largely due to the excellent performance of the Canadian firms and also Argentina (24.4%). Europe, Middle East and Africa revenues were heavily impacted by the ongoing Eurozone crisis with overall growth of 0.6% reflecting a difficult year for many European economies. There was strong growth however in South Africa (34.8%), Botswana and Morocco (both 17%) and, with new member firms in Algeria and Senegal, the prospects for continued growth in Africa look strong.

Global combined revenues for year ending 30 September 2011

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