Friday, January 29, 2010

Deloitte: Worst Behind Us. Hiring and Retaining Talent Are Top Priorities


We just talked about PricewaterhouseCoopers’ 13th annual global CEO survey, which showed a remarkable improvement in CEO confidence this year as compared to last year 2008....



Thursday, January 28, 2010

KPMG Predicts Modest Uptick in Global Mergers and Acquisitions




With the new year 2010 just open, the forecasts for the year ahead have started.


First out is KPMG’s Global MA Predictor which estimates that M&A appetite and capacity will move up in the next 12 months, with increased forward PE ratios from a year ago pointing to a higher deal-making appetite. Furthermore, the capacity to do deals is heightened by a decline in net debt to EBITDA ratios from earlier levels....



Wednesday, January 27, 2010

PricewaterhouseCoopers Finds CEO More Confident, Hiring


PricewaterhouseCoopers typically releases its 13th Annual Global CEO Survey (1,200 CEO interviews in Q4-2009) in sync with World Economic Forum at Davos.


Last year, CEOs were feeling insecure and diffident about the future of the global economy and of their companies...


Apple iPad Priced at $499, Impact on Deloitte Study


So Apple just announced the price of the iPad at $499 and that it will be available in March and April 2010.


We earlier had speculated a price of $1,000 and 20 million units, at half the price, lets assume that price-elasticity moves the numbers sold to 35 million (Note that Apple just announced it had sold 250 million iPods), the incremental sales are $17.5 billion, that's only a few billion below our previous number....




Deloitte Expects Tens of Millions iPads Sold

Apple just today displayed to the world its much anticipated ipad tablet PC, with Steve Jobs wowing the crowd with its amazing functionalities. Finally, speculation on the name was laid to rest - the ipad is just a vowel away from the ipod! Boring as the name is, the potential for this device is simply huge...


We've moved. Click here to go to the full post at the new Big Four Blog at Big4.com! 

Tuesday, January 26, 2010

Scammers Attack PricewaterhouseCoopers and Deloitte


It appears that scam artists have latched on to Big Four firms.


At this time, we see that PricewaterhouseCoopers and Deloitte are the victims of two publicly known attacks....



Deloitte Is Top Hedge Fund Service Provider Of Big Four Firms


We see from a recent press release that Deloitte was selected as the top Big Four accounting firm service provider by hedge funds with $1 billion or more in assets, ranking second overall, in the Institutional Investor 2009 Alpha Awards. Deloitte has now ranked first among the Big Four in five consecutive years...



Deloitte, Ernst and Young, KPMG and PricewaterhouseCoopers At Davos 2010




The World Economic Forum starts tomorrow Wednesday January 27, 2010 for four jam-packed days of the world’s most powerful and influential leaders from industry, government, academia and non-profit organizations. The sessions cover an extraordinary variety of interesting topics and bring together the planet’s best minds to discuss, debate, validate and set forth actions to improve human life and sensibility...





Friday, January 22, 2010

All Big Four Firms Are Best Companies To Work For In 2009


All the Big Four firms recently made Fortune’s 2009 “100 Best Companies to Work For” list, though not at the very top as we have become very accustomed to seeing in BusinessWeek or Diversity or Working Mothers magazine. Nonetheless a very creditable performance against a tough crowd of equally impressive and quality peers. 2009 sported tougher competition as three of the five firms dropped rank from the 2008 listing...



Wednesday, January 20, 2010

PricewaterhouseCooopers Gains Top Rating From Gartner




We see from a recent press release that PricewaterhouseCoopers has received a “Strong Positive” rating in Gartner’s Global Finance Management Consulting Services MarketScope Report, which was published recently on December 21, 2009...



Thursday, January 14, 2010

Accenture’s Animal Ads: Can Dancing Elephants and Jumping Frogs Help?





About four weeks ago, on Sunday December 13th, 2009, Accenture ended its six-year sponsorship of Tiger Woods. We had blogged extensively on this topic:

On December 9th, we argued that Accenture should not continue sponsorship on moral grounds and should be the first to drop sponsorship...



Friday, January 08, 2010

Auditor Merry Go Round at Overstock.com


                              We were intrigued by a recent quote from Overstock.com's President.



On December 29, 2009,we saw, "It is nice to be back with a Big Four accounting firm," said Jonathan Johnson, President of Overstock.com. "We are pleased to have the resources and professionalism that KPMG brings as our auditors. We will work closely with them to timely file our 2009 Form 10-K. In the meantime, we remain in discussions with the SEC to answer the staff's questions on the accounting matters that lead to our filing an unreviewed Form 10-Q for Q3."...





Tuesday, January 05, 2010

THE 2009 BIG FOUR FIRMS PERFORMANCE ANALYSIS

THE 2009 BIG FOUR FIRMS PERFORMANCE ANALYSIS














An Analysis Of The 2009 Financial Performance Of The World’s Largest Accounting Firms

By Big4.com

January 2010

THE 2009 BIG FOUR FIRMS PERFORMANCE ANALYSIS
________________________________________

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY



2009 was a difficult year overall for the Big Four accounting firms: Deloitte, Ernst & Young (E&Y), KPMG and PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), as their financial performance was affected by tough external conditions, slow global economic growth, cost-conscious clients and sluggish merger and acquisition activity....