Investment Banking 101
What bankers do, how deals work and how to break in.
Taught by Dipesh Koirala · CFA, Financial Analyst
What you'll learn
- Explain how coverage, product, capital markets and sales and trading teams divide the work of an investment bank
- Bridge from equity value to enterprise value and walk a change in depreciation through all three financial statements
- Build a trading comparables table and apply EV/EBITDA and P/E ranges to value a company
- Walk through a five-year unlevered DCF, including WACC and terminal value, in under two minutes
- Map the stages of a sell-side M&A auction and an IPO from mandate to closing
- Plan a recruiting timeline and prepare structured answers to common technical and fit interview questions
About this course
Investment Banking 101 is for students, graduates and early-career analysts who want to understand what investment bankers actually do and how to break into the industry. You will learn how a bank is organised, from coverage and product groups to sales and trading, and how the core deal types work: mergers and acquisitions, IPOs, equity and debt capital markets and leveraged buyouts. You will build the valuation toolkit bankers use every day, including trading comparables, precedent transactions and discounted cash flow, and learn how a pitch book and football field are put together. The final lessons cover the recruiting timeline, networking, CVs and the technical and behavioural interview questions that decide first rounds and superdays. You should be comfortable reading a basic income statement and balance sheet and using a spreadsheet; no previous finance job is needed.
Course content
7 lessons- 1Inside an Investment BankThe divisions of a bank, who does what on a deal team and how the main types of firm differ.Preview
- 2Enterprise Value, Equity Value and the Accounting You NeedHow the three statements link, the bridge from equity value to enterprise value and the classic depreciation question.
- 3Trading Comparables and Precedent TransactionsValuing a company by what similar businesses trade at and what buyers have paid for them.
- 4Discounted Cash Flow ValuationProjecting free cash flow, discounting it at WACC and handling the terminal value sensibly.
- 5Pitch Books and the Football FieldHow bankers package analysis into a client presentation and summarise valuation on one page.
- 6How M&A Deals and IPOs RunThe stages of a sell-side auction, an IPO and a leveraged buyout, from kick-off to closing.
- 7Recruiting and Interview PrepThe recruiting timeline, networking that works and how to answer technical and fit questions.