Majority of Chinese accounting firms small

Despite great growth potential, revenues of China's long list of accounting firms are still dwarfed by global industry leaders, latest figures showed.

China has 8,295 accounting firms, 86 ones more than a year before, providing services to more than 2,500 listed companies and more than 4.2 million businesses and government agencies, said the Chinese Institute of Certified Public Accountants.

Among those firms, there are only six whose annual revenue exceeds 2 billion yuan (326 million U.S. dollars) and only 46 whose annual revenue reached 100 million yuan last year.

China lacks globally renowned accounting firms in an industry dominated by the Big Four, namely PricewaterhouseCoopers, Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu, KPMG and Ernst & Young, who all post billions of dollars in annual revenues.

As the Chinese economy enters a new era, industrial upgrading, innovation, green and low-carbon development will play a more important role, which means accounting firms, a key part of the high-end service industry, will have stronger growth momentum, said Chen Yugui, secretary general of the institute. Endi