Accounting firms in South Korea saw their combined sales rise 8.5 percent annually in the 2016 fiscal year, helped by a modest gain in revenues from their audits and consulting businesses, data showed Tuesday.

The combined sales of 165 accounting firms stood at 2.67 trillion won ($2.37 billion) in fiscal 2016 that ended March of this year, compared with 2.46 trillion won a year earlier, according to the data by the Financial Supervisory Service.

The nation's top four accounting firms -- Samil PwC, Samjong KPMG, Deloitte Anjin and EY Hanyoung -- accounted for 50.4 percent of total sales in fiscal 2016, down 0.9 percentage point from a year earlier.

In fiscal 2016, accounting firms paid a total of 16.4 billion won in compensation after losing a lawsuit over their audits, compared with compensation of 4.7 trillion won the previous year.

Deloitte Anjin was ordered to suspend new audits for one year in April this year for the firm's accounting irregularities of troubled Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering Co.

Until April 4 next year, Deloitte Anjin is barred from signing new audit contracts, the FSS said.

Lawsuits are also underway seeking compensation worth 164.9 billion won against Deloitte Anjin over its accounting irregularities regarding Daewoo Shipbuilding. (Yonhap)