Azets strengthens audit team with financial services specialist

UK top 10 accountancy and advisory firm Azets has bolstered its Yorkshire audit and assurance offering with a strategic new hire.

The growing Financial Services (FS) sector and increased demand from clients have led the firm to appoint Alain de Braekeleer as a financial services audit partner.

Based in Leeds, Alain is a seasoned FS specialist who brings a wealth of experience from his 20 years in the FS audit practice at KPMG.

His time there included leading numerous Financial Statement and Client Money (CASS) audits as well as providing a variety of non-audit services to clients.

Alain has experience across a wide array of FS firms and he has supported and worked with companies and groups of all shapes and sizes.

His appointment comes as Azets’ audit business continues to grow in Yorkshire. Leeds has become the UK’s second city for financial services, while the North of England has one of the largest concentrations of financial and business services firms in Europe.

Russell Turner, regional managing director for Yorkshire, said: “We’re very pleased to welcome Alain to Azets.

“He brings exceptional experience and expertise in the highly-specialist, sophisticated and exacting FS audit space which will allow us to bring this new service to clients across the north.

“This will complement both our existing audit and assurance offering in the region and our well-established and successful FS audit services in London and the south east.”

Chris Butt, head of audit for Yorkshire, said: “Azets has recorded multiple years of double-digit organic growth across our audit business.

“Alain is a strong and strategic hire with an excellent reputation whose appointment represents an investment in the future of the company.

“It is an opportunity to widen our client base and build a new business arm from the ground up across the region.”

Alain de Braekeleer, financial services audit partner, said: “I’m thrilled to be joining Azets at such an exciting time in its growth and look forward to supporting many of the varied companies that make up the thriving Financial Services sector in Yorkshire.”

Alain will support clients in asset management, asset finance and fintech as well as a range of other types of financial services firms.

The FS sector contributes £278bn to the UK economy and supports nearly 2.5m jobs with 1.1m in FS and 1.3 in related professional services – according to HM Treasury and the City of London’s latest State of the Sector report. It contributes more than £100bn in tax revenue.

According to the Department for Business & Trade, the north of England has one of the largest concentrations of financial and business services in Europe.

Leeds is the UK’s second largest city for financial services and has been rated as one of the top 20 fastest growing global fintech hubs to watch, according to the Invest Leeds partnership.

The financial services and professional services sector in the Leeds city region generates £1.3bn annually and employs more than 18,300 people, according to Invest Leeds.

The city is home to a substantial cluster of banking – with 30 national and international banks, 415 accountancy firms and a growing insurance sector.

It is also home to the UK Infrastructure Bank, while the Bank of England and Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) also have offices in the city.

Azets is a top 10 UK accountancy and business advisory firm and the largest regional business advisor to SMEs in the UK, delivering accounting, tax, audit, business and advisory services in the UK and internationally.

It employs 335 people across its three offices in Yorkshire in Leeds, Bradford and York.