- Bearish investors have been flashing warning signs about a potential recession, but EY CEO Carmine Di Sibio pointed out that he is not seeing any signs as of yet
Bearish markets and recessions are largely driven by declines in manufacturing and falling economic activity lasting for more than a few months thus causing higher unemployment and the falling of consumer purchases. Many analysts believe that we will be entering a recession soon, but EY CEO Carmine Di Sibio recently conducted an interview saying that he does not see any signs of a slowdown yet.
“We could see slowdowns because our clients will tell us that they will stop investing and therefore it would slow up our business as well. And we’re not seeing that. We are seeing continuing investment around the world: U.S, Europe, Asia-Pac. Mostly because companies understand they have to continue to transform themselves,” said Di Sibio in an interview on Street Signs Asia on CNBC. “And even though, there are uncertainties, there are certainly geopolitical uncertainties… most companies understand that if they don’t transform themselves, they would be around for the long-term.”
Di Sibio was appointed as the head of EY earlier this year as the seventh global chairman and CEO since the company formed about 30 years ago. Prior to becoming CEO of EY, Di Sibio was the head of the company’s global client service practice for 6 years. And Di Sibio originally joined EY in 1985 while overseeing a number of the firm’s largest clients in advisory roles.
In July, EY announced that 733 employees were promoted to partner around the world and for the fifth consecutive year, women and emerging markets represent nearly a third of the year’s new partner class at 30% and 33%, respectively. And a couple of months ago, the firm announced record combined global revenues of $36.4 billion for the financial year ended June 2019.
“While the past year has seen a number of strains in the global economy – from trade tensions, protectionism and recession fears – we have achieved strong growth from our continued focus on long-term value creation using technology to transform traditional EY services and to launch new, innovative solutions,” explained Di Sibio in a statement. “As a result, more EY clients are turning to us for both traditional and a newer range of services. EY clients see us as a strategic part of their wider ecosystem enabling their success in today’s marketplace.
EY has a plan to invest $1 billion over two years in new technology solutions and capabilities. And in FY19, EY saw a threefold increase in the number of blockchain activities, which includes EY Document Intelligence, a blockchain solution with Microsoft for content rights and royalties management, a major investment in EY Blockchain Analyzer, and over 120,000 EY employees and 250,000 clients using the global audit platform EY Canvas.
This past year, EY also acquired companies like Pangea3 and Riverview Law to strengthen its focus on legal services. And the company also signed new alliance agreements with companies like Anaplan, Blue Prism, Kinaxis, Oliver Wight, SailPoint Technologies, Stratio Big Data, Symantec, and Thomson Reuters.
Featured photo credit: Carmine Di Sibio via EY.com
