SURVEYS & RESEARCH

CPA PE Deal Tracker™: 57% Say PE Threatens the CPA Brand.

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But They’ll Take the Money.

Most CPAs are concerned that private equity is undermining the CPA profession’s reputation for independence and objectivity. Only 10% say PE will have little or no impact. Fewer still can say PE will improve client service. (CPA Trendlines)

By CPA Trendlines

It’s a toss-up between CPAs opposed to PE and those unopposed. (CPA Trendlines)

As the CPA Trendlines CPA PE Deal Tracker™ adds 13 more closings for the month of May, a new survey shows accountants worrying about PE tarnishing the image and reputation of the profession. But half say they might take the money anyway.

MORE Private Equity | MORE All 500-plus Headline Deals for the Last 10 Years

The CPA PE Deal Tracker™ now contains more than 500 headline deals and developments. Through May 31, the tracker shows 91 headline 2026 events, including 83 M&A deals. Full-year 2025 finished with 190 significant events, including 178 M&A deals. The last three consecutive months have produced the first sustained plateau in 12-month trailing M&A activity since the acceleration phase that began in 2023.

Meanwhile, nearly half of the professionals in the new CPA Trendlines survey — 49.5 percent — describe themselves as decidedly opposed to private equity investment: fiercely independent, not interested, never ever.

The rest, a bare but discernible majority, are not. They would do a deal for the right price. Or they are already in play. Or have already done a deal.

“It only makes sense to keep our options open,” says Michael Royer of Royer Advisors and Accountants in Falmouth, Maine. He is not opposed, and he is not sold, adding “it’s still a personal business — and we don’t know the full impact of AI.”

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The Fastest-Growing Jobs in Accounting Are Not Accounting Jobs

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CPAs Not Wanted: Firms Build a New Workforce – without Accountants

CPA firms have added just 3,930 accountants and auditors in the last five years, far fewer than the expansions in sales, finance, technology, project management and data science.

By CPA Trendlines
Cornerstone Report

CPA firms are building a new workforce, and they’re doing it without CPAs.

Firms are hiring thousands of new staffers in jobs that look less like traditional accounting and more like sales, systems and management, according to new data parsed by CPA Trendlines.

MORE Private Equity’s Accounting Playbook Is Shifting from Dealmaking to Operating Systems | Why CPAs Quit Public Accounting | Inside Tax Season’s Hidden Shift: Same Work, Fewer People, Higher Cost | MORE Cornerstone Reports | Outlook & Analysis | Staffing & Recruiting | Surveys & Research | Tax | Pay & Compensation |

The public accounting profession has added 3,930 accountant and auditor positions since 2021, which pales in comparison to the 12,250 new sales representatives, 11,140 new financial managers, or 8,130 new computer and information systems managers. Firms added 4,370 new software developers and 4,190 new project management specialists. They also added 2,210 new data scientists. Even the number of chief executives has grown faster.

The pattern shows firms are not simply replacing missing CPAs and CPA candidates. They are building a different kind of firm, with more people assigned to sell services, manage clients, run systems, build software and coordinate projects. CPAs need not apply. READ MORE →

Private Equity’s Accounting Playbook Is Shifting from Dealmaking to Operating Systems

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Prove It: PE-Backed Firms Must Now Deliver on Their Big Strategies

CPA Trendlines CPA-PE Deal Tracker™ — May 2026

Target Platform/Buyer Sponsor Funding Strategy
Jackson Thornton Ascend Alpine Investors PE-backed Wealth management, Gulf Coast expansion
Jefferson Wells U.S. Sikich Bain Capital involvement Institutionally backed Consulting and staffing capabilities
Copeland Buhl Frazier & Deeter General Atlantic PE-backed First Midwest footprint
Price Kong Aprio Charlesbank PE-backed Arizona and cannabis specialization
SWKJD Citrin Cooperman Blackstone PE-backed South Florida expansion
Gorfine Schiller & Gardyn Sorren DFW Capital PE-backed Mid-Atlantic expansion
Gordon Advisors Cohen & Co. Lovell Minnick PE-backed Michigan expansion
ArightCo Abbott Stringham & Lynch — Conventional M&A CAS and fractional CFO scaling
ASO Advisors Windsor Path Family-office backed Private capital Platform’s second deal
GBC Advisory Springline Advisory Trinity Hunt Partners PE-backed Oklahoma expansion
MCA Connect Grant Thornton Advisors New Mountain Capital PE-backed AI and digital transformation
Burke & Associates Platform Accounting Group / Shoreline Cynosure Group Private capital Massachusetts expansion
Of the month’s notable deals, 10 are funded by outside capital, led by Grant Thornton’s deal for a tech consultancy and Sikich’s for a staffing service.
Half “decidedly opposed” and the other half in favor, in talks or done. (CPA Trendlines Research)

By CPA Trendlines

Marking a new phase in the private equity takeover of the CPA business, the next test for accounting platforms will be proving that serial acquisitions can be converted into integrated firms, not just larger collections of offices, partners and legacy systems.

MORE CPA-PE DEAL TRACKER™: How Big Buyouts Are Turning the Profession into a Platform |  PE Wars: The CPA Platform Economy Is Concentrating Fast | Alan Whitman: Why the Next Big CPA Firms Won’t Look Like CPA Firms | The PE Takeover: Audit Problem? What Audit Problem? | 1,000 Deals Show Where PE Money in Accounting Really Goes. | The 7.6x Machine: How Grassroots Firms Are Taking Private Equity for a Ride | Deal Tracker(™): PE Platforms Accelerate the Grab for CPA Firms | With Apax Sale, CohnReznick Starts Building a National Platform | PE Deal Tracker™ for Feb. 2026: 57 deals in 60 days | PE Deal Tracker™ Update: Alan Whitman Plants a Flag in the Private Equity Landscape | Alan Whitman: Breaking the Mold with PE Backing
MORE Private Equity

Call it: The Implementation Imperative. It’s the place where grand schemes on paper meet the concrete realities of running a business. The first phase was acquisition. The second was consolidation. The next is all about making it work.

The May 2026 edition of the CPA Trendlines CPA-PE Deal Tracker™ illustrates the change. And a CPA Trendlines survey in April shows 44% of accountants are eager, open or already closed on a deal.

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CPA-PE Deal Tracker™: How Big Buyouts Are Turning the Profession into a Platform

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Venture capital crashes the private equity party in accounting.

Consolidation constellation: Sponsors in blue, platforms in red, targets in gold.

By CPA Trendlines Research

The CPA Trendlines CPA PE Deal Tracker™ shows the steep rise in deal flow, hitting more than 450.

Private equity’s push into accounting is entering a new and more complicated phase: platform building, sponsor recycling, technology investments, blended tax and wealth services — and now, a new pipeline of cash from venture capital.

MORE PE Wars: The CPA Platform Economy Is Concentrating Fast | Alan Whitman: Why the Next Big CPA Firms Won’t Look Like CPA Firms | Gear Up for Growth | The PE Takeover: Audit Problem? What Audit Problem? | 1,000 Deals Show Where PE Money in Accounting Really Goes. | The 7.6x Machine: How Grassroots Firms Are Taking Private Equity for a Ride | Deal Tracker: PE Platforms Accelerate the Grab for CPA Firms | With Apax Sale, CohnReznick Starts Building a National Platform | PE Deal Tracker for Feb. 2026: 57 deals in 60 days | PE Deal Tracker Update: Alan Whitman Plants a Flag in the Private Equity Landscape | Alan Whitman: Breaking the Mold with PE Backing | Holistic Guide
MORE Private Equity

This month’s CPA Trendlines CPA-PE Deal Tracker™ shows nine new deals in April, down from the first-quarter deal-closing frenzy but bringing the year-to-date deal count through April 30 to 78, well ahead of the 44 logged in the same window of 2025.

The broader verified dataset now includes 452 in-scope events, giving CPA Trendlines a clearer view of what private capital is doing after its first wave of accounting-firm investments.

The latest data does not show a retreat. It shows a transformation. The new gambits go well beyond roll-ups, and include service line extensions, corporate carve-outs, cross-industry tie-ups, recapitalizations, continuations and a buzzy new venture-backed startup.

World domination

The deal models are sprawling in all directions as big money battles for a dwindling number of prime firms and squeezes for synergies in the firms they’ve acquired.

In the mix, accounting is morphing from a profession into a platform. A launchpad from which to sell a growing, and traditionally conflict-laden, range of products and services. From tax planning to wealth management, from outsourced accounting systems to internal audit, and from risk management to insurance sales.

A once incongruous, even contradictory, collection of services are being acquired, aligned and advanced. The ambition is market encirclement. The impulse is world domination.

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