KPMG's Move to Practice Law in Arizona May Signal Paradigm Shift

Big Law has long feared that the Big Four accounting firms–Deloitte, PWC, KPMG, and EY–would start practicing law in the US. Now, that may soon be a reality.

Big law's fear is that the Big Four has scale that dwarfs even the largest US law firms, and its dominance in legal technology could lead to a paradigm shift in how legal services are delivered.

But American lawyers have always had a safety net. The ethical rules for lawyers say that non-lawyers can’t own law firms. This has put a fence around US law firms that has kept out the Big Four.

Now, a couple of states, including Arizona, have changed these rules to allow non-lawyer ownership. KPMG has applied to practice law in Arizona.

On this episode of On The Merits, Bloomberg law reporters Justin Henry, Amanda Iacone, and Roy Strom discuss KPMG’s big move and what it could mean for the legal industry.

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