Baker Tilly Int’l reports 5% growth to $3.2 bln

* Asia grows 40%, LatAm up 24%

Baker Tilly International recently reported its financial performance for the 12-months ending June 2011 with global combined revenues rising by 5% to $3.2 bln. The international accounting and advisory network maintained its position as the world's eighth largest by combined revenue, closing the gap on both sixth placed RSM International and Grant Thornton in seventh.
"We have delivered robust results in what is a difficult global environment," said Geoff Barnes, CEO and President of Baker Tilly International.
"There is no doubt that our results accurately mirror the economic environment in which our clients are operating, reflecting a two-tier recovery with different regions moving at different speeds. The combined revenues of our member firms in Asia Pacific leapt 40%, and in Latin America 24%, driven by strong regional growth, while the difficulties of the Eurozone and the sluggish US economy were reflected in the modest results in these regions.”
"Drivers for this growth come from a number of areas, with our member firms continuing to invest in new offices to increase reach, expanding into new areas through mergers and acquisitions and grow non-audit service lines such as consultancy where we saw an increase of 21% last year,” Barnes said.
"We are seeing some strong trends globally in the challenges that our clients face: for example privately held businesses tend to be more dependent on debt than equity, and therefore are finding access to credit more of a problem. Many are owner managed and, as their founders move closer to retirement, are facing a range of issues around succession planning," he concluded.