If your ultimate dream is to break into investment banking and then later break into private equity or a hedge fund, then by just reading this blog you’re on the right track.

About Buyside Hustle

After growing up in a small town of <30K people, I went to a “semi-target” undergraduate school where I majored in Finance. After being told about investment banking from one of my mentors during my Freshman year of college, I knew it was exactly what I wanted to do.

I definitely wasn’t top of my class, not even close to being one the smartest of the people I went to school with. But I had a few relatable internships under my belt in corporate finance and somehow got lucky landing an internship my Junior year summer at one of those so called “elite” investment banks. I went through a dozen of final rounds/superdays and got rejected at all of them except my very last one.

I was one of just a few interns in my group that was notorious for hiring just one of the interns each year, so I knew I had to buckle down that summer and be a top ranked banking intern. Somehow I got lucky and got the offer. I still remember to this day how happy I was when I got that full-time offer.

It was one of the most pivotal moments of my career and has led me to where I am today. After graduating from undergrad, I started my career in investment banking, then after a few years, broke into the buyside at a large multi-manager hedge fund, quit that $500K / year job after just one year, and have since worked at a $1Bn+ single manager hedge fund.

#1 Reason Why I Landed An Investment Banking Offer

No doubt the #1 reason I stood out amongst my peers that summer and received the full-time offer was because I started that summer already knowing the basics of Excel, financial modeling and going through basic financial statements.

Some of my peers barely had much Excel knowledge or knew much if any about finance/modeling. Even though everyone knows you’re an intern and have low expectations, they quickly fell behind because full-time analysts always prefer to work with someone who can contribute, take the work load off them and doesn’t need much guidance.

So at 20 years old, how was I able to stand out amongst my peers, know how to use Excel, parse through financial statements and do all the valuation modeling that is required as an investment banker?

Best Investment You Can Make Early On In Your Career

It’s funny thinking back when I was young how cheap I was and how I usually didn’t want to spend $$ outside of college to invest in myself. When you get older your mentality shifts dramatically and you realize that investing in yourself is undoubtedly the best investment you can make, especially when you are younger.

The reason why I am where I am today is because I spent countless hours to learn everything I could about investment banking and how to be good at it.

I remember 10+ years ago when I was studying for investment banking interviews, I came across Wall Street Prep. It was the best resource I could find to prepare for investment banking and build the skillset I needed to talk in interviews and outperform my peers on the job.

Full Course Review – Wall Street Prep Financial & Valuation Modeling

To land a job as an investment banker, you need to have all the basics down. You can’t go in interviews expecting to land a job if you can’t already speak the investment banking lingo and be able to answer basic interview questions.

Nobody wants to hire someone who doesn’t already show that he/she has taken the initiative to learn all they can about the job before applying. The #1 skillset I want to see when hiring someone is that they have the curiosity to learn.

If you want to skip the review below and enroll in the course today, then make sure to use the 15% promo code included in the link below:

There are a few key topics you need to know before breaking into an investment banking role. Each of these topics are included/covered in depth with the flagship Wall Street Prep course in over 40 hours of lessons divided by subject:

1. Financial Statement Modeling
2. Discounted Cash Flow Analysis (DCF)
3. M&A (Accretion / Dilution Analysis)
4. Trading Comps
5. Transaction Comps
6. Leverage Buyout (LBO) Modeling

1. Financial Statement Modeling

If you don’t know how to model a company’s financials, then you aren’t going to make it in investment banking or the buyside at a private equity firm or hedge fund. One of the biggest complaints higher ups have of Associates and Analysts at investment banks is that they don’t know how to model.

The course starts out with teaching you how to project out a full 3 statement model from scratch and walks through:

• Forecasting each line item of the income statement, balance sheet and cash flow statement
• Building out the revenue drivers
• Projecting working capital
• Balancing the model
• Modeling best practices

Everyone single public company out there files three statement financials. These statements are the most important part of a company’s quarterly or annual report as they walk through the financial health of a company. Understanding how to analyze and project these statements is the most important tool when it comes to understanding a company and ultimately figuring out how to value it.

Wall Street Prep walks you through the entire process from start to finish and help you understand how the statements are linked together.

2. Discounted Cash Flow Analysis (DCF)

In every investment banking interview, I guarantee they will ask you a few questions on a DCF. Every single investment bank out there uses a discounted cash flow analysis when it comes to figuring out the true worth of a company. When your client is looking to sell itself or buy another company, a DCF is one of the main analyses you do that you present to the Board when they try to make a decision.

The second part of this course walks you through everything you need to know to do a DCF:

• All the mechanics of a DCF
• Differences between equity/enterprise value
• Advantages and disadvantages of a DCF
• Levered vs. unlevered free cash flow
• How to build out a DCF
• Exit multiple vs. perpetuity growth methodologies
• Calculating WACC

3. M&A Modeling (Accretion / Dilution Analysis)

Questions around merger math accretion / dilution will likely also come up in interviews. I can’t tell you how many merger models I did during my time in investment banking. It had to have been 50+ over the course of a few years.

Merger math is basically done to understand how a combined company looks after an acquisition/merger compared to on a standalone basis. Managing Directors of banks love to show these analyses in pitch books when they go to client meetings to show management teams potential M&A ideas.

The Wall Street Prep course walks you through all the basics:

• Deal consideration (Sources/Uses)
• Calculating pro forma EPS
• Differences between 100% stock sale vs. 100% cash sale or a mix of both
• Impact on pro forma EPS in various cases
• Step by step on how to build out a merger model

4. Trading Comps

Trading comps are the most widely used form of valuation across not only investment banking, but also on the buyside at a private equity firm or hedge fund. It is the quickest way to determine a company’s valuation relative to its peers.

You will learn how to select and “scrub” a comparable company’s financials and figure out the right multiples depending on the company/industry for a variety of companies.

5. Transaction Comps

Transaction comps are another very common valuation methodology bankers use. Here you learn how to figure out the purchase price and relevant multiples of recently acquired comparable companies, and learn how to applies those to your target company to determine valuation.  

6. Leverage Buyout (LBO) Modeling

Depending on what investment banking group you join, LBO modeling may or may not be that important. It is much more relevant when it comes to private equity as everything you do in that industry revolves around building out LBOs.

That said, LBOs come up from time to time in investment banking and definitely in interviews with private equity firms, so best to start learning how to do one as soon as possible.

The Wall Street Prep course walks you through how to build a complex LBO model from scratch:

• Talks about what makes a good LBO target
• Different pieces of debt associated with an LBO
• Step by step guide on modeling an LBO, from identifying sources/uses, projecting income statement/balance sheet/cash flows, to modeling the debt waterfall and determining returns/IRRs

Who is Wall Street Prep For?

This course is not for anyone who already knows how to model the financials of a company or someone who has already gone through a couple years of investment banking.

The course helps those who:

1. Are in college or fresh out of college looking to start a finance career
2. Need help prepping for investment banking interviews
3. Need help preparing for working full-time in finance
4. Just wants to get ahead and to learn the basics of financial modeling/valuation methodologies

Wall Street Prep is the easiest way to learn everything you need to know to give you a good foundation to start as investment banking analyst or intern. What’s really good about the course is that it walks you through everything step by step and provides you with all the materials you need (PDF slides and Excel Models) so you can complete all the material along with the instructor.

Recent Wall Street Prep Reviews By Customers

15% Off Coupon Code – Enroll Today

I can guarantee you that you will not break into a job on Wall Street without a good understanding of financial modeling, so get ahead of everyone else and start preparing today.

Click the link below today to get access to the 15% off coupon code.

Financial & Valuation Modeling Certification Program: Step-By-Step Online Course​

Get the exact same program top investment banks and financial institutions use to train their professionals. Learn 3-Statement Modeling, DCF, Trading and Transaction Comps, M&A and LBO.