Fall in M&A activity to prompt fee slump
The corporate finance arms of the Big Five accounting firms are facing a drop in revenues as the global slump in mergers and acquisitions activity hits the UK.
And KPMG, the top-ranked accounting firm in terms of size and value of deals it advised on, stands to lose the most in revenues and bonuses, following figures released by Thomson Financials quarterly report.
The report said European activity fell by nearly half in the first quarter of 2001, dropping to $155.5bn (Pounds 107.4bn) from $327.9bn, (Pounds 226bn) mirroring a worldwide trend which saw the value of deals fall by more than one third from $1.17tn to $459bn.
The UK was as once again identified as the largest single European market with a value of Pounds 33bn, but the number of deals fell from 407 in the first quarter of 2000 to just 217 for first three months of 2001.
KPMG, despite advising on business valued at $10.8bn and capturing 6% of the European market, suffered a drop in its advisory business as a result, being appointed to just 30 deals in 2001, compared with 64 in 2000.
Similarly, PwC experienced a 50% slump as the number of deals fell to 15 deals from 31 in 2000.
The fall in the number of deals is expected to affect both the big investment banks in the City and those financial advisors involved in smaller deals.
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