By Victor Paquet and Pierre Six (Mergersight Operations) & Carlo Leopardi, Tommaso Arona and Alina Shaikh (Boston University partners)
Walkthrough
For up-to-date deals organized by industries, financial advisors, and legal advisors visit the rest of TheMergerSight website.
The deal
Be prepared to extensively discuss at least one deal from the bank you’re interviewing at. Try to find a deal that interests you, and make sure you have a good story behind choosing the deal. Pick a deal that also aligns with the type of deals that the firm or group you are applying for specializes in. Ensure that the deal you pick is relatively new, as this will show to the interviewer that you keep up-to-date with on-going transactions in the market.
Preparation
Before the interview, make sure that you have done your research and that you understand the competitive dynamics within the industry and the macroeconomic environment that the deal takes place in. This will help you talk about the deal’s rationale, and serve as a spring board to add your personal perspective to the deal.
What to consider?
- Name of Acquirer and Target Company
- Approximate transaction size, premium price, and relevant trading multiples
- Strategic Rationale (for US deals, this can be found on the SEC’s Form S-4)
- Acquirer and target’s share prices movements post-announcement
- Personal analysis —> Was this a good deal? Potential risks?
Strategic Rationale
For the strategic rationale, think about what revenue or what cost synergies the deal brings to both parties. You can tie this reasoning back into how the markets are reacting to the announcement of the deal. This can nicely lead to you adding your opinion regarding the integration process, you can discuss the feasibility of the integration by analyzing any systematic or idiosyncratic risks. Ultimately, based on the prior research you have conducted about the industry and the proposed transaction benefits, you should be able to add your personal perspective to the deal and further analyze how you envision the deal changing the industry landscape.
If the interviewer was staffed on that deal by chance, this may be a great opportunity to turn the interview into a more conversational setting by asking questions about the deal.