O'Dwyer's published their annual PR agency rankings yesterday with Edelman again way above the pack after reporting 22% growth to $395,494,858 in net earnings.

Other highlights from the report:

WeissComm Partners...a newcomer to the list, had the biggest growth among the top 50 - up 77% to $13 million.

Ruder Finn, the fourth biggest independent with $93.5M in fees, declined 5.8%.

Sixteen of the 181 firms had gains of 40% or more; 23 grew from 30%-39%; 27 grew from 20%-29% and 36 grew from 10% to 19%.

The total with double-figure gains was 84.

For the sixth straight year, PR firms owned by the five conglomerates (WPP, Omnicom, Interpublic, Publicis, Havas), were not allowed by their parent companies to report any statistics including employment figures. They have cited the danger of being in violation of Sarbanes-Oxley because accounting rules differ from country to country.

The complete list can be found here.