Can anyone offer a day in the life? A recent seminar has me looking at this avenue now.
Hey man - I used to work in this field. A day in the life is going to be somewhat contingent on what level you come in at and what kind of firm are you are at. Overall, there is a lot of plug and chug once you get up the learning curve. Brief considerations: 1) Big 4 Accounting firms - downside is the audit support. The valuation groups do a lot of work supporting the audit teams to “audit” fair value or values for PE portfolio companies. This kind of work sounds a lot cooler than it is because even if the client provides you with garbage, you’ll be under pressure from the audit teams to “sign-off” and the mentality is that the work will always get done in the end. 2) Independent/Smaller Valuation Firms - the work will vary based on what kind of valuations you are doing. The thing to bear in mind when working at these kinds of firms are that there are no quality requirements or barriers to entry in the field. Therefore, as you move up in the firm, you’ll always be haggling over fee compression and worrying about being undercut by smaller firms. 3) IB/HLHZ FAS - My understanding is that the pay is a little better than 1) or 2) above, but there are several groups within HLHZ which are absolute sweat shops and are not fun places work work, IMHO. Let me know if you want to discuss further or specifics.
Thanks. The md from hlhz could not make it the other day. But I spoke in depth with an md who worked at #2. The independent type of operation intrigued me so I’m going to his office later to learn more. This MBA time is nice since I can explore all I want.
Thanks. The md from hlhz could not make it the other day. But I spoke in depth with an md who worked at #2. The independent type of operation intrigued me so I’m going to his office later to learn more. This MBA time is nice since I can explore all I want.
Thanks for the info. I am looking at a boutique M&A advisory/valuation firm in a small midwest city. What skills would a firm like that be looking for? I have no valuation experience really, but some contacts at the firm. Also, it seems like they are much more CPA focused since a majority of the people have the cert. Is a CFA relevant at all for M&A advisory because I am sitting for L1 in June. Thanks. m
mep_cfa’10 Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Thanks for the info. I am looking at a boutique > M&A advisory/valuation firm in a small midwest > city. What skills would a firm like that be > looking for? I have no valuation experience > really, but some contacts at the firm. Also, it > seems like they are much more CPA focused since a > majority of the people have the cert. Is a CFA > relevant at all for M&A advisory because I am > sitting for L1 in June. Thanks. > > m I meant to also add, how do you get deal experience in M&A if don’t currently have one? Is my best bet just to get a hold of my contacts at the company and ask to take them out for coffee/lunch and ask questions to learn more about the firm/position/etc?
valuation can range from nearly 99% boring acounting-like stuff to nearly 99% cool stuff* *my definition of cool stuff is building your own financial models to value complex instruments, but yours could be something else such as statistical and financial data analysis for large litigation/economic damages cases or whatever in general, the smaller and more local the firm is, the larger it will be the “traditional” valuation/i.e. accounting-heavy work. the number of CPAs vs CFAs seems to be a good preliminary insight into what they do. this topic has also been beaten to death in order postings so do a search on this forum
QuantJock_MBA Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Can anyone offer a day in the life? A recent > seminar has me looking at this avenue now. Houlihan would likely place you into a senior consultant/senior associate position due to your MBA. A typical day would likely include industry research, searching for/screening comparable companies and transactions, some model population, report writing and maybe number/assumption checking of other consultants. I don’t know first-hand what kind of hours they expect at that level, but it is a billable hours based industry, so the more you bill the better you look to senior management (assuming they can collect on your billings). As you demonstrate your ability to work independently and take on more responsibility, they will likely give it to you. As you move up, day-to-day activities will include more selling and supervision of projects. Houlihan is a premier name in the valuation industry, so compensation is at the upper end for valuation and clients tend to be higher profile than at a lot of other valuation firms. They are also a monster in middle market IB, so there would presumably be potential to move up the ladder into true IB. I know they do more fairness opinions than any other firm in the country (number of opinions, not dollar value of deals), but not sure which groups within the firm actually do them. If you are serious about valuation, you should talk to Duff & Phelps as well. They are on par with Houlihan in pure valuation (better in some areas, weaker in others), but don’t offer as much IB potential. Big 4 would also be an option, but there is a lot of audit review work in addition to the more interesting stuff.
Thanks for that. Right now I’m treading water learning all I can about various career paths. Valuation sounds like something that would fit my niche. I’ve also been looking at wealth management/portfolio management type of paths. I’m sure I seem disoriented on this board with career inquiries from tax to valuation, but I simply have a lot of time left in school and feel compelled to find something I truely enjoy.
Before you meet with them, try to get up to speed on the appropriate accounting standards and tax regulations, as they drive a lot of valuation work. On the accounting side, look into Accounting Standards Codification 350 (used to be SFAS 142), ASC 820 (SFAS 157), ASC 718 (SFAS 123r) and ASC 805 (SFAS 141r). On the tax side, IRC 409a and 422 drive a lot of work, as do ESOP regulations and GRAT regulations. Gaining conversational familiarity with international accounting standards would also help.
mep_cfa’10 Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Thanks for the info. I am looking at a boutique > M&A advisory/valuation firm in a small midwest > city. What skills would a firm like that be > looking for? I have no valuation experience > really, but some contacts at the firm. Also, it > seems like they are much more CPA focused since a > majority of the people have the cert. Is a CFA > relevant at all for M&A advisory because I am > sitting for L1 in June. Thanks. > > m I am at a boutique M&A firm. A CPA can be valuable, b/c we do deal with a lot of accounting issues, but from a valuation standpoint, I think the CFA designation has more value. The CFA is obviously not 100% relevant for M&A, but there is plenty of useful knowledge that can be applied, especially in Level 2 (specifically FSA, Equity & Corp Fin, which is probably why those were my strongest topics). A top tier MBA would be ideal, but that wasn’t really an option for me, so my firm recommended I go the CFA route. It is important that you are analytical, have expertise in Excel modeling, and excellent written and oral communication skills. Through an interview process, they would likely test whether you have all of those skills. It would obviously be ideal for every candidate to have deal experience, but everyone has to start somewhere, right? You will just have to prove that you have the aptitude to hit the ground running.
steph96 Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > mep_cfa’10 Wrote: > -------------------------------------------------- > ----- > > Thanks for the info. I am looking at a boutique > > M&A advisory/valuation firm in a small midwest > > city. What skills would a firm like that be > > looking for? I have no valuation experience > > really, but some contacts at the firm. Also, it > > seems like they are much more CPA focused since > a > > majority of the people have the cert. Is a CFA > > relevant at all for M&A advisory because I am > > sitting for L1 in June. Thanks. > > > > m > > > I am at a boutique M&A firm. A CPA can be > valuable, b/c we do deal with a lot of accounting > issues, but from a valuation standpoint, I think > the CFA designation has more value. The CFA is > obviously not 100% relevant for M&A, but there is > plenty of useful knowledge that can be applied, > especially in Level 2 (specifically FSA, Equity & > Corp Fin, which is probably why those were my > strongest topics). A top tier MBA would be ideal, > but that wasn’t really an option for me, so my > firm recommended I go the CFA route. > > It is important that you are analytical, have > expertise in Excel modeling, and excellent written > and oral communication skills. Through an > interview process, they would likely test whether > you have all of those skills. It would obviously > be ideal for every candidate to have deal > experience, but everyone has to start somewhere, > right? You will just have to prove that you have > the aptitude to hit the ground running. Thanks for the insight. I have pretty good Excel modeling skills, though they are more MBS cash flow / tax modeling. How would you suggest learning “transaction” modeling? Buy one of the more popular books posted on here and try some case studies?