CPA PE Deal Tracker™: The Next Deal Cycle Comes into View

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By CPA Trendlines Research

Going into the fourth quarter of 2026, Wall Street’s buying spree for accounting firms is cooling as platform firms digest a two-year surge of acquisitions and the earliest investors, from three to five years ago, begin to cash out, according to the CPA Trendlines CPA PE Deal Tracker™.

MORE Private Equity: Michael Hoover: Growth Without Discipline Comes at a Cost | Big 4 Transparency | CBIZ Told Grant Thornton No, No, No, Before Saying Yes | PE Already Knows Your Price. Do You? | How Private Equity Turns CPA Loyalty into Legal Risk | Ira Rosenbloom: PE Forces Firms to Pick a Future | The Disruptors | Allan Koltin: What Elite CPA Firms Do Differently | Gear Up for Growth

The October 2026 edition of the CPA PE Deal Tracker™ shows accounting’s private-equity deal flow easing in the third quarter, with 37 acquisitions in the U.S. and Canada, down from 42 a year earlier and a far cry from this year’s first-quarter surge of 58. The Tracker now counts 400 such deals in the U.S. and Canada since its records began in December 2016, plus 87 it has found elsewhere, for 487 worldwide, although its coverage outside North America is not systematic.

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Michael Hoover: Growth Without Discipline Comes at a Cost | Big 4 Transparency

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Disciplined choices, talent investment, and cultural alignment matter more than chasing every opportunity.

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Big 4 Transparency
By Dominic Piscopo, CPA
For CPA Trendlines

As private equity reshapes the accounting profession, Bennett Thrasher is making a different kind of bet. The top 100 firm intends to remain independent.

Michael Hoover, Bennett Thrasher’s chief growth and strategy officer, joins host Dominic Piscopo on The Big 4 Transparency Podcast to explain why the firm considers independence central to its growth strategy—and why saying no may be one of the most important disciplines a growing firm can develop.

MORE Dominic Piscopo | MORE Private Equity | MORE Pay & Compensation

“The biggest bet,” Hoover says, “is just remaining fiercely independent.”

That commitment shapes how Bennett Thrasher approaches everything from new service lines and acquisitions to recruiting and compensation. Rather than pursuing growth for its own sake, Hoover says the firm is working toward a long-term strategy for 2030 and scrutinizing whether each opportunity advances that vision.

In a market where firms are searching for new revenue streams, the temptation to pursue the latest “shiny object” can be powerful. But every new initiative consumes capital, leadership attention, and talent. Hoover argues that firms must examine not only an opportunity’s potential revenue, but also what they may have to postpone or abandon to pursue it.

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CBIZ Told Grant Thornton No, No, No, Before Saying Yes

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But CBIZ Was Already Looking for a Way Out When Grant Thornton Called

A galaxy of firms involved in the CBIZ-GT deal.

The board rejected $47, $52 and $54.30 a share — and asked for $56 — before a June 8 “best and final” $55.

By CPA Trendlines Research
Special Report

CBIZ was looking for a way out of its predicament months before Grant Thornton called, and longer still before an activist investor wrote to tell the board what to do. In the end, CBIZ took $55 per share from Grant Thornton, but only after rejecting three lower offers from the firm.

MORE Special Report on the CBIZ-Grant Thornton Deal: 

  1. Fatal Attraction: How the Marcum Deal Set Up CBIZ for the Grant Thornton Takeover
  2. CBIZ Tells Grant Thornton No, No, No, Before Saying Yes
  3. Grant Thornton Flexes PE Muscle in CBIZ Deal
  4. CBIZ: Spanning 2 Rollup Eras in 2 Centuries
  5. $55 a Share: Who Won, Who Lost in CBIZ’s 29-Year Rollup
  6. CPA PE Deal Tracker™: The Consolidator Gets Consolidated

COMING NEXT: Was CBIZ CEO Jerry Grisko Worth It? MORE Private Equity

In March, with the stock at $27 and falling toward $25 — roughly 70% below its February 2025 peak — CBIZ’s board went to Goldman Sachs for a preliminary view of what the company was worth and what its strategic alternatives were, “if any.”

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Fatal Attraction: How the Marcum Deal Set Up CBIZ for the Grant Thornton Takeover

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CBIZ Grows 52%. Then Growth Stalls, Stock Falls, GT Moves In. 

CEOs Peko, Grisko, Bunn

 

By CPA Trendlines Research
Special Report

Marcum made CBIZ bigger almost overnight. It also quadrupled the debt, more than tripled interest expense, and left executives figuring their best option was Grant Thornton’s $5-billion buyout offer.

MORE Special Report on the CBIZ-Grant Thornton Deal: 

  1. Fatal Attraction: How the Marcum Deal Set Up CBIZ for the Grant Thornton Takeover
  2. CBIZ Tells Grant Thornton No, No, No, Before Saying Yes
  3. Grant Thornton Flexes PE Muscle in CBIZ Deal
  4. CBIZ: Spanning 2 Rollup Eras in 2 Centuries
  5. $55 a Share: Who Won, Who Lost in CBIZ’s 29-Year Rollup
  6. CPA PE Deal Tracker™: The Consolidator Gets Consolidated

COMING NEXT: Was CBIZ CEO Jerry Grisko Worth It? MORE Private Equity

CBIZ entered 2026 looking like one of accounting’s great consolidators. Revenue had risen 52.1% in 2025 to $2.758 billion, and net income had increased 181.3% to $115.4 million.

And yet, by July 28, the company is ready to take $55 per share, better than the $46.70 the day before, but less than the $88.65 peak last year.

Ryan Bunn, the activist shareholder at Reference Equity, which had been pressing the company since mid-June to raise equity and keep buying firms, says the decision “feels like capitulation.”

The arithmetic underneath the growth may help explain why.

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$55 a Share: Who Won, Who Lost in CBIZ’s 29-Year Rollup

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For Marcum partners, it’s complicated.

At $55, GT is offering the best price all year, not as good as last year.

By CPA Trendlines Research
Special Report

Grant Thornton’s cash offer creates four very different CBIZ histories: a modest return for some long-term holders, a nearly 4,800% gain for investors who bought after the 2000 collapse, a 38% loss from the 2025 peak and no single answer for former Marcum partners.

MORE Special Report on the CBIZ-Grant Thornton Deal: 
    1. Fatal Attraction: How the Marcum Deal Set Up CBIZ for the Grant Thornton Takeover
    2. CBIZ Tells Grant Thornton No, No, No, Before Saying Yes
    3. Grant Thornton Flexes PE Muscle in CBIZ Deal
    4. CBIZ: Spanning 2 Rollup Eras in 2 Centuries
    5. $55 a Share: Who Won, Who Lost in CBIZ’s 29-Year Rollup
    6. The Grant Thornton Payday: $22 Million for CBIZ CEO Grisko
MORE Private Equity

Same deal. Same $55 a share, cash, on the table for every CBIZ shareholder. Four completely different outcomes, depending on when you bought in.

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CBIZ: Spanning 2 Rollup Eras in 2 Centuries

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CBIZ, once known as Century Business Services,  started with a “rapacious appetite” for acquisitions. Now it’s the appetizer.

By CPA Trendlines Research
Special Report

The company that helped pioneer Wall Street-backed accounting consolidation in the 1990s is set to be absorbed by today’s private-capital version of the same idea.

MORE Special Report on the CBIZ-Grant Thornton Deal: 

  1. Fatal Attraction: How the Marcum Deal Set Up CBIZ for the Grant Thornton Takeover
  2. CBIZ Tells Grant Thornton No, No, No, Before Saying Yes
  3. Grant Thornton Flexes PE Muscle in CBIZ Deal
  4. CBIZ: Spanning 2 Rollup Eras in 2 Centuries
  5. $55 a Share: Who Won, Who Lost in CBIZ’s 29-Year Rollup
  6. CPA PE Deal Tracker™: The Consolidator Gets Consolidated

COMING NEXT: Was CBIZ CEO Jerry Grisko Worth It? MORE Private Equity

Twenty-seven years ago, a rollup called Century Business Services was buying accounting firms with what its own mergers chief called a “rapacious appetite.” Today it goes by a different name — CBIZ. And on July 28, it agreed to be bought.
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Grant Thornton Flexes PE Muscle in CBIZ Deal

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The biggest bank account wins.

By CPA Trendlines Research
Special Report

If the Grant Thornton deal for CBIZ suggests the next stage of accounting firm consolidation, then size alone, as measured in top firm rankings, is no longer the decisive advantage.

MORE Special Report on the CBIZ-Grant Thornton Deal: 

  1. Fatal Attraction: How the Marcum Deal Set Up CBIZ for the Grant Thornton Takeover
  2. CBIZ Tells Grant Thornton No, No, No, Before Saying Yes
  3. Grant Thornton Flexes PE Muscle in CBIZ Deal
  4. CBIZ: Spanning 2 Rollup Eras in 2 Centuries
  5. $55 a Share: Who Won, Who Lost in CBIZ’s 29-Year Rollup
  6. CPA PE Deal Tracker™: The Consolidator Gets Consolidated

COMING NEXT: Was CBIZ CEO Jerry Grisko Worth It? MORE Private Equity

Instead, capital that can be deployed repeatedly into acquisitions, technology and integration is today’s essential ingredient. READ MORE →