PE Is Buying Accounting Firms, and the Profession Is Changing Shape
Grant Thornton's $55-a-share deal for CBIZ is the largest accounting merger in 25 years. Firms across the industry are splitting in two to take private-equity capital. Regulators are still writing the rules.
NEW YORK, September 15, 2026. Grant Thornton is acquiring fellow top-10 accounting firm CBIZ in an all-cash deal. CBIZ shareholders get $55 a share, a roughly 54% premium to the stock's recent trading price. The deal is expected to close in the fourth quarter. It's the largest combination in the profession in more than 25 years, according to Journal of Accountancy. The last one that size was the 1998 merger that formed PwC. The combined firm will employ more than 34,500 people across 20-plus countries. Global revenue will top $7.5B. New Mountain Capital invested in Grant Thornton in 2024. It's now putting in incremental equity to fund the purchase. After the deal closes, Grant Thornton plans to spin off CBIZ's benefits and insurance unit. That new company will also be backed by New Mountain.
Crowe LLP struck its own private-equity deal in June. KKR is making what Crowe called a sizable equity investment, expected to close in the third quarter. The structure has become the industry standard. Crowe LLP stays a licensed CPA firm and keeps every attest engagement, including audits and reviews. A new entity, Crowe Advisory LLC, takes the outside capital instead. It handles tax, consulting, and other nonattest work. Baker Tilly took its own PE money in 2023. The top-10 firm made news the same week. It's moving headquarters from Chicago to New York and buying a top-100 New York firm.
Schellman's deal in March showed something newer than a first-time PE investment: the secondary flip. The top-50 cybersecurity-compliance firm brought in Goldman Sachs Alternatives to replace Lightyear Capital as its majority owner. That's nearly five years after Lightyear first took the position. Lightyear stays on as a minority investor. Citrin Cooperman, a top-20 firm, ran the same play in early 2025. It became the first large firm to flip its PE ownership. A flip only happens once capital has already cycled through a deal once. That's a sign the asset class is maturing, not simply growing.
Regulators are still writing rules for the structure that makes all of this possible. The AICPA's Professional Ethics Executive Committee spent 2026 on independence guidance for these "alternative practice structures." An initial exposure draft went out for public comment in December 2025. Feedback prompted more revisions. A second draft is planned after an October 2026 meeting. It's also weighing a new rule barring attest clients from investing in the firms that audit them. The International Ethics Standards Board for Accountants is running its own parallel review. It cites the same trend.
Every deal in this stretch uses the same workaround. Split the firm. Keep the audit book on the partner-owned side. Sell equity in everything else. CBIZ, Crowe, and Schellman all used that structure to take outside capital without touching audit independence on paper. It's also exactly what regulators are now writing rules around. The wave that started it shows no sign of slowing.