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OUTLOOK & ANALYSIS

Ten Predictions: PE, Alternate Practice Structures and More

Every year, the 2025 Rosenberg MAP Survey asks the industry’s top consultants to share their observations from CPA firms across the country: How do you think the next 12 months will unfold? Trends? Predictions? Other thoughts? Also, how would you assess the last 12 months? Trends? Observations? Struggles?

Valuations have changed … and risen.

By Phil Whitman
 The Rosenberg Survey

While many trends will continue, here are my Top 10 predictions:

  1. Traditional M&A activity, CPA firm to CPA firm, will continue to be very robust.

Not all CPA firms will qualify for investment by private equity and other strategic investors. As such, firms will combine for a variety of reasons including: succession and transitions, increasing profitability and gross revenues, expansion of service offerings, expansion of geographic coverage as well as adding additional depth and breadth in existing service lines.

MORE: The 2025 Rosenberg MAP Survey is available from CPA Trendlines here.

  1. Valuations of CPA firms will increase as private equity creates bidding wars between each other. We have already seen demand of CPA firms of certain sizes exceeding supply. As such, we believe that even the larger private equity-backed firms will see acquisitions of smaller firms as not only lucrative additions but significantly more supply. Approximately 10,000 +\- firms with two or more partners that are members of the AICPA. Many of these smaller firms are very profitable and have been seeing multiples of two to three times gross revenues.

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OUTLOOK & ANALYSIS

Tech, Talent, Advisory Will Fuel Growth

Every year, the 2025 Rosenberg MAP Survey asks the industry’s top consultants to share their observations from CPA firms across the country: How do you think the next 12 months will unfold? Trends? Predictions? Other thoughts? Also, how would you assess the last 12 months? Trends? Observations? Struggles?

Accounting firms are finding themselves in one of two camps.

By Scott Moore
 The Rosenberg Survey

Growth-oriented firms will continue to explore their options to sustain their longevity and competitiveness. Whether they remain independently owned or become investor-backed, key areas of focus will be to seek ways to harness technology, optimize their talent strategies and elevate client value with advisory models.

MORE: The 2025 Rosenberg MAP Survey is available from CPA Trendlines here.

A renewed focus on growth has gained momentum, fueled by investor interest, technological advancements and the adoption of advisory models.
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CHARTS & GRAPHS

2026 Outlook: Why Small Firms, PE Giants, and the Middle Are Headed in Different Directions

A profession splitting in three.

By CPA Trendlines Research

The U.S. accounting profession is no longer moving along a single growth continuum. It is splitting into three distinct economic paths—each governed by a different logic, facing different challenges, and offering different prospects. In 2026, these paths are likely to diverge further.

MORE Outlook & Analysis

At one end, solo and micro-firm accountants are increasingly choosing independence and control over scale. At the other end, large firms backed by private equity are consolidating aggressively in areas where profits are already concentrated. Between them sits the traditional mid-size firm, caught between two models that are pulling the profession apart.

For many mid-size firms, 2026 will force a choice: Grow larger and enter the consolidation race? Or deliberately shrink, specialize, and adopt a more solo-like economic model?

For smaller practices, it means they will find a supportive environment, provided they specialize and price their services intelligently. Large firms will accelerate consolidation and extract scale-driven returns. And mid-size firms will face increasing pressure to choose a direction. READ MORE →

OUTLOOK & ANALYSIS

The 8 Mega Trends Every CPA Needs to Understand before 2026

What happens to accountants when AI agents run the economy.

By CPA Trendlines Research

For most of the past decade, “digital transformation” meant faster systems, better dashboards, and incremental automation layered on top of human decision-making. By 2026, that framing will no longer hold.

The defining shift now underway is not simply more technology, but who—or what—executes economic activity. Across finance, operations, compliance, and professional services, autonomous systems are moving from support roles into execution roles. Software is no longer just informing decisions. it is initiating them.

MORE on Artificial Intelligence

That transition is reshaping how work is done, how risk is distributed, and how trust is established. It is also quietly repositioning the tax and accounting profession—from recordkeeper and reviewer to certifier of machine-driven outcomes.

CPA Trendlines believes eight mega trends will define 2026—not as isolated developments, but as a converging system change. READ MORE →

ABOUT US

We’re Honored

Thank you, and Congratulations to the CPA Trendlines community of influencers.

By CPA Trendlines Research

CPA Trendlines Research extends its congratulations and appreciation to the 39 authors, creators, contributors, collaborators and guests who appear in this year’s edition of the Top 100 Most Influential People by Accounting Today.

“We’re very grateful to the brilliant thought leaders and changemakers who make CPA Trendlines what it is,” says CPA Trendlines founder and CEO Rick Telberg.

Accounting Today calls CPA Trendlines “a platform for a wide range of diverse voices to share exciting new ideas through articles, podcasts, videos and books, while also offering useful research data and practical intelligence on the critical issues facing the profession to an audience of more than half a million accountants.” And terms Telberg “one of the great impresarios of accounting.”

Among this year’s Top 100, including the new names to watch:

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OUTLOOK & ANALYSIS

Four Strategic Fronts for Accounting Firms

Every year, the 2025 Rosenberg MAP Survey asks the industry’s top consultants to share their observations from CPA firms across the country: How do you think the next 12 months will unfold? Trends? Predictions? Other thoughts? Also, how would you assess the last 12 months? Trends? Observations? Struggles?

For some, independence is a strategic choice.

By Gary Thomson
 The Rosenberg Survey

The next 12 months will see independent-minded firms pressing harder on four strategic fronts – clarifying their five-year vision, defining the priorities to get there, calculating the cost, and determining where the capital will come from. These questions will keep the mergers and acquisitions market hot, as some firms pursue scale or stability through deals while strong, well-capitalized players step into market gaps left by consolidation.

MORE: The 2025 Rosenberg MAP Survey is available from CPA Trendlines here.
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Artificial intelligence and automation will move from experiments to deliberate deployment, with clear expectations for efficiency, insight and safeguards. Outsourcing will remain a growth lever, but firms will also invest more heavily in their people – expanding career opportunities, developing leaders and using culture as a talent magnet.
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PRO Member Exclusive

What’s In, What’s Out for the Digital CPA in 2026

Cloud Foundations Out, AI-Powered Growth In.

People you know: Some of the CPA Trendlines contributors and collaborators on the agenda at the 2025 Digital CPA conference.

By CPA Trendlines Research

Tax and accounting firms appear poised in 2026 to double down on AI-driven services, accelerate developments in blockchain accounting, add new automations to CAS platforms, pursue transformative audits, and reimagine talent pipelines.

MORE: Tech and Fintech

If this year’s Digital CPA Conference in Washington, D.C., is any indication, then 2026 will be characterized by AI ubiquity, CAS at the core, and strategic boldness.

Comparing the 2024 and 2025 events back-to-back reveals a dramatic evolution in themes, speakers, and firm strategies — effectively a “what’s out vs. what’s in” for the profession.

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ABOUT US

When Tax Meets AI, Savvy Tax Pros Turn to ‘Tax Platforms 2026’

Tax Platforms 2026: Request your FREE ebook today

Your 2026 Roadmap for the Tax Tech Transformation

Planning, Research, and the Rise of Intelligent Automation.

Artificial intelligence is moving beyond the testing phase. It’s now powering the everyday workflows of tax professionals. Tech providers are racing to integrate AI. And new startups are reshaping how firms research, plan, and deliver advice.

DOWNLOAD: Get the free ebook here

This report by CPA Trendlines Research and powered by the Center for Accounting Transformation breaks down the changing landscape across two essential areas

1 – Tax Planning and

2 – Tax Research

This report reveals where innovation meets efficiency and where reliability matters most.

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ACCOUNTING ARC

Get Ready Before It Gets Busy: Dec. 10 Webinar with Accounting ARC

The “Tax Season Readiness” webinar provides quick, practical strategies to help firms prepare for the hectic demands of the upcoming months.

Click here to learn more and register

By CPA Trendlines

As tax professionals gear up for another challenging filing season, the Center for Accounting Transformation and CPA Trendlines Research invite practitioners, firm owners, and IT professionals to join a powerhouse panel for “Tax Season Readiness: Practical Steps for a Smoother Busy Season,” a 90-minute live webinar and Accounting ARC Live event on Dec. 10, 2025, from 2 to 3:30 p.m. ET.

For more details or to register, visit cpa.click/taxready.

The session will feature the popular Accounting ARC trio—Donny Shimamoto, Liz Mason, and Byron Patrick—alongside special guest thought leaders Dr. Jackie Meyer, CPA; Rory Henry; and Katelyn Hopson, who will bring fresh insights into tax efficiency, firm capacity, and modern advisory methods.

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PRO Member Exclusive

IRS Set for a Turbulent 2026 Season as TIGTA Flags Persistent Weaknesses

Heading into 2026, problems from the past several filing seasons are still unresolved.

By CPA Trendlines Research

The coming 2026 filing season is shaping up to be another high-stakes test of the Internal Revenue Service’s capacity to serve taxpayers and practitioners, with new reports from the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration offering an unusually candid look at the agency’s most vulnerable operational seams.

Join the survey. Get the results.

MORE: Firms Brace for a Tough Tax Season

How smart pros are prepping for tax season:
Join the survey. Get the results.

Taken together, the findings forecast a filing season characterized by incremental improvements in training but overshadowed by enduring structural constraints in telephone service, submission processing, identity verification, and staffing.

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