It all counts

Gripping news from the world of audit: student numbers are falling, the Big Four firms are earning more from audit, and competition for audit among FTSE 250 companies appear to be improving… a little.

A report from the Financial Reporting Council finds that the number of UK accounting students fell by 0.2%, though they rose worldwide by 0.1%.

But the Big Four firms appear to be doing well: the FRC’s annual report shows total fee income was up 11.1% in 2023. That was buoyed by audit fee income rising 19.5%, though non-audit fees fell 8.9%.

The number of FTSE 250 companies audited by non-Big Four firms rose from six to 10 last year.

Told you it was gripping.

Counting the months

More than half of audit, risk and internal controls professionals in a survey say they are working on conforming with a revised UK corporate governance code by 2026.

Of those, 41 say they will conform during the current year, while the other 18% say it will be done next year or the year after.

According to the technology solutions company AuditBoard, a chunky 40% of those polled say they already have the revised code nailed down in their organisations.

The new code, released in January this year, saw the introduction of a directors’ report on internal controls. It did, however, jettison other long-trailed measures, including reports on narrative reporting and sustainability issues.

Counting the noughts

We recently reported that OpenAI, developers of the ChatGPT generative AI solution, was in the process of switching its governance model from a profit-is-a-secondary-interest model to a profit-is-my-theme-song model.

The issue of ChatGPT’s governance and purpose has been a public point of debate ever since chief executive and founder Sam Altman controversially left the company and returned within a week.

Anyway, the governance change of tune has been everywhere in the news over the past 10 days, or so, and, this week, OpenAI reports that the fundraising round that was underway while it was all going off has raised $6.6bn—making OpenAI worth $157bn. That puts the governance change into perspective, does it not?