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UK: Barclays claims Big Four auditor shakeup would be ‘detrimental’

By  |  July 8, 2013

As the UK’s Office of Fair Trading works on how to break up the so-called Big Four – the top four companies that perform 95 percent of FTSE 350 audits – Barclays bank has issued a letter to the regulator warning it against major overhauls. According to reports, Barclays said radical changes would be to the “detriment” of shareholders. The Competition Commission is currently looking at ways to break up the dominant four – KPMG, PwC, Deloitte and Earnst & Yong – after the case was referred to the regulator by the OFT. The Competition Commission agrees with the OFT that the market needs a shakeup, claiming that the Four’s dominance has led to higher prices and less innovation. The  is considering requiring companies to rotate their auditors after a fixed period of time. But the UK’s second-largest lender has warned against the idea and, in its letter to the Competition Commission, said the current state of the auditing market “is working for its shareholders.”

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    CORRECTION: A previous version of this article reported the Office of Fair Trading is reviewing the auditing market. The OFT referred the case to the Competition Commission in 2011.

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