KPMG's revenues in 2009 increased to €12.66 million from €10.63 million in 2008, according to the firm's 2010 Transparency Report. Revenue from its audit services amounted to €5.89 million (compared to €4.5 million in 2008), while revenue from its tax and advisory services amounted to €6.77 million (compared to €6.58 million in 2008).
The report said that audit billable hours represented just over 60 per cent of total billable hours and that the greater part of tax and advisory revenue came from services provided to non-audit clients.
At the end of 2009 the firm's headcount increased to 235 full-timers, up from 210 in 2008. The report reflects KPMG's belief in the importance of a strong minded, independent and objective audit profession as an essential element in rebuilding investor confidence in the current economic climate.
The report highlights that the firm's latest People Survey showed that 94 per cent of its employees indicated that they would recommend KPMG as a good place to work. In the same survey 98 per cent of employees said they were proud to be associated with KPMG.
The firm's governance structure consists of its partners, an executive management committee, a risk management committee, an audit committee, a tax committee and an advisory committee.
The report says that later this year the firm will implement eAudIT, "the next generation KPMG audit tool".
"We firmly believe that the 19 per cent growth we experienced in 2009, which resulted mostly from new audit mandates, reflects our clients' confidence in the quality and integrity of our audits. You can only do that if you have the best people serving your clients and from this perspective we see no difference between our business strategy and our people strategy," said Joseph C. Schembri, KPMG's senior partner.
"We have experienced sustained growth since Malta joined the EU - from 2005 to 2009 we had a compound annual growth rate of about 18 per cent. Indeed in the past year we experienced the highest level of growth of the Big-4 firms in Malta. This makes it even more incumbent on us to ensure that our commitment to quality is maintained and enhanced. We believe that it is this commitment which ultimately allowed us to grow in this fashion over this extended period," said Tonio Zarb, KPMG's managing partner.
KPMG issued its 2010 Transparency Report pursuant to the provisions of the Accountancy Profession Act requiring audit firms that carry out statutory audits for public interest entities to publish annually information in their website relating to their governance and quality structures.
Among KMPG's public interest entities audit clients are FimBank plc, Go plc, Grand Harbour Marina plc, HSBC Bank Malta plc, Lombard Bank Malta plc, Medserv plc and RS2 Software plc.