Of course, the revelation in the Economist was not news for all of us at Mazars. It was, however, a stark confirmation of the consequences of accelerating trends that somehow remained under the radar for our industry. The increasing digitalization of informational and transactional flows in business means that in the not-so-distant future real-time reconciliation, including self-correcting journal entries and click-button financial statements, will be a reality.

Thus, the role of the accountant, auditor and indeed entire finance department will transform profoundly. Even if, as Bill Gates said, « we overestimate the change that will occur in the next two years and underestimate the ...