BDO extends lead as top junior market auditor October 29, 2018 BDO, the UK’s sixth-largest audit firm, has hugely extended its lead as the UK’s top auditor of mid-size, Alternative Investment Market (Aim)-listed firms – more than quadrupling the gap between it and second-placed KPMG in the past half a year. New data from Adviser Rankings shows BDO now has 149 Aim-listed clients, 23 more than [...]
Audit watchdog boss Stephen Haddrill set to step down amid probe October 28, 2018 The chief executive of the Financial Reporting Council (FRC), Stephen Haddrill, is reportedly preparing to step down amid a government probe into the watchdog’s operations. Haddrill is planning to leave within months, Sky News reported. He has led the FRC, which monitors and regulates the audit sector, since 2009. Citing an anonymous source, Sky said [...]
Singaporean developer snaps up City tower in £385m deal October 26, 2018 Singaporean-listed City Developments Limited (CDL) has acquired a 26-storey tower overlooking the Bank of England for £385m from Blackstone Group. The deal, announced today, represents one of the largest single asset sales in the City of London this year. The property at 125 Old Broad Street occupies a site of 0.7 acres directly overlooking the [...]
Audit’s perfect storm: How bean counters found themselves at the centre of a public uproar October 21, 2018 On the the surface, there is little reason for audit to get the blood pumping. The reality, however, is quite different, and threatens to present the sector’s biggest players – sprawling multi-nationals used to finding that all news is good news when you count the beans – with the toughest challenge they have seen in [...]
Auditors face fresh headache as shareholder adviser eyes industry October 18, 2018 The world’s largest adviser to shareholders is to ramp up its scrutiny of auditors, in a move that will pile further pressure on the UK’s embattled beancounters amid a series of industry controversies. Auditors will be facing another headache at their shareholder meetings next year after the Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS) today unveiled plans to [...]
Mind the ethnicity pay gap: Data is the key to a transparent and diverse society October 16, 2018 To be human is to have bias – both conscious and unconscious. If all our decisions were based on logic alone, carefully calculated and perfectly balanced, we would be robots. The benefits of being human are the passion, empathy, and creativity we can inject into our decision-making and working lives. But there are downsides. Read [...]
Outrage-induced regulation will not fix the broken audit market October 12, 2018 The audit market is broken. Don’t take my word for it – ask Rachel Reeves, the Labour MP who chairs the BEIS select committee, or Liberal Democrat leader Vince Cable, or even the Conservative business secretary Greg Clark, who last month ordered an inquiry into competition in the sector. With such cross-party concerns, it should not [...]
Karen Millen buys Coast after collapse but 300 jobs still at risk October 11, 2018 Fashion retailer Coast has collapsed into administration, putting an estimated 300 jobs at risk. Retail rival Karen Millen has bought the brand’s website and UK department store concessions, it announced this evening, however all 24 stand alone Coast outlets and European concessions will close. Read more: Retail sales growth slumps after bumper summe A total of [...]
UK startups hold onto Europe’s venture crown with £1.4bn in funding October 11, 2018 UK startups continued to draw in attention from venture capital (VC) firms in the third quarter as Europe’s premier investment hotspot, posting a £1.4bn total draw in the three months to September compared to £1.31bn in the same quarter last year. Data compiled by KPMG Enterprise revealed the UK remained at the top of the [...]
Theresa May launches consultation into forcing firms to report ethnicity pay figures October 11, 2018 KPMG, WPP and the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) are among a number of businesses to have signed up to a new charter by Theresa May that aims to improve the recruitment and progression of ethnic minority employees. Alongside the charter the Prime Minister has also launched a consultation into mandatory ethnicity pay reporting, following last [...]