Performance of the Top 100 Firms

Source: Inside Public Accounting
The following excerpts are reproduced, with permission, from The Platt Consulting Group:

Another Good Year For The Nation’s Top 100, But Small Cracks In The Armor Are Starting To Show

The Top 100 firms enjoyed their fourth straight year of double-digit growth, ending with an impressive 14% jump in net fees. Growth in net income was up 14.6% for these firms, also the fourth year in a row for double-digit growth. Overall, average partner compensation climbed another 5% to $485,133 – up 40% over the past six years. For equity owners, compensation growth is even more impressive – up 9% over last year to a whopping $580,714 average. These firms have fine-tuned their management practices and are much more efficient with the staff they have, as measured by personnel costs as a percentage of net revenue, now at 44.4% – the sixth straight year of decline (down from 48.3% in ’03).

But amid all the good news are small signs that the sizzling growth over the past four years is beginning to slow.

Firms with a year-end in the first two quarters of 2008 grew at just over 10%, compared to their counterparts with an earlier year-end at Dec. 31, 2007, which grew at an average of over 16%; net income as a percent of revenue (31.9%) has dropped for the first time in four years.

For the complete article, click here.

From Inside Public Accounting, August 2008, p. 1, The Platt Consulting Group (www.plattgroupllc.com). Subscription $389 per year; back issues—nonsubscribers $50. 317-733-1920.

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