Macquarie Bank

i was wondering the same thing...

does Macquaire stop at any school or do they do all their recruiting online?

any word from anyone yet?

Has anyone heard from them? I think the deadline is only for Baruch College...other colleges have different deadline dates.

fuck

At my Ivy target it went like this:

1. On-campus interview (2 on 1) - Early Oct.
2. Psychometric Test (3-4 hours computer-based) - Last week
3. Final round this Fri in NY

I got raped by Macquarie in final rounds. I remember all the questions distinctly, if anyone wants to know them let me know,
mrcanuck

@mrcanuck, i'd really appreciate some insight into the final round questions. Would you mind PMing me with your experience? Thanks

1st round phone interview tomorrow

I'm assuming you guys are applying to the IB Funds division?

If so, the questions in the first rounds are the obvious ones. Fit based, little technical, nothing too bad. After the testing you move to last round, which is often with your local office/division head. They will often ask two major questions and drill down from there: one about a recent transaction and the other an ad hoc valuation of an infrastructure asset.

Know about the Macquarie model, how they make their fees, why they are different, why the credit market hasn't hurt them etc. Talk about the debt levels that they hold off their books, how it is matched to stable cash flows that grow in the future. Know Chanos' criticisms and their defense story. Know about the current restructure of the business. Be able to explain why infrastructure.

Always have an opinion, always make it positive. Macquarie is an aggresive bank that is intent on growing, they are looking for bullish people that can sniff out a dollar.

MrCanuck,

I have my second round tomorrow. Assuming things go well, I'll have a final round. What was it like? Have you heard the verdict?

OH shite sorry guys, I just realized that I never answered all these desperate emails. I'm assuming you've had final rounds already so its too late...here were some of the RIDICULOUS questions asked at Macquarie Toronto (no calculator, just pen/paper):

What is ninth root of 700
When does $1 invested @ 7% interest rate double
Would you prefer $1000 now or perpetual income of $1 a day (OK this one's easy)
15^5
What is the IRR of the 407 toll road around Toronto that MacQ invested in (R*# how the fuck are you supposed to know!?!?!?)

- There is a pond with one lily at time 0. The lily doubles every minute such that the pond is covered with lillies at time 60. At what time is the lilly 75% covered with lillies...all fucking ridiculous questions...

...I'm glad I got rejected, I hated those retards with a passion and their firm blows really hard. Read the review on breakingviews.com, MacQ is famous for using accounting magic to boost returns on toll roads to 20+%. Fuck, those returns are hard to come by even in PE/VC these days.

Anyway, they are looking for hardcore acct/fin nerds who are good with numbers and have 0 personality. They do advisory work for public clients, MacQ has a really structure where the IBD department pitches the internal PE dept with deals....whatever fuck them,
MrCanuck

They don't do advisory work for public clients*
They have a weird structure**

haha, no worries. I haven't heard from them yet post-final round (since last friday) and I just signed with another bank. So I guess the joke's on them!

sounds like someone's bitter mr. canuck. yeah they ask technical questions like that, but those are to see your thought process. obviously they don't expect you to precisely nail all of those, but they want to see what your intuition is.

no need to spew vitriol here, they just weren't right for you. they might be right for others, and not just "acct/fin nerds".

Got a first round coming up, any insight on what kind of questions they ask? Typical behavioral and technical or do they ask some of those interesting questions listed above?

.

Usually those questions above are second round and beyond. First round is usually with HR; mostly behavioural/fit questions and walk me through your resume.

OK maybe I am too harsh, but I still think they're idiots. Look if you have a PURE TECHNICAL AND NUMBER FOCUSED INTERVIEW you will get people whose lives revolve around numbers. Pure and simple. That's a MacQ banker for you, I'm sure he/she can do great things with an Excel spreadsheet, but ask them to close a deal and they'll be fumbling like idiots.

I found them to be rude and arrogant for no reason. AND, I had to threaten them with a small-claims lawsuit in order to get back my cash that I spent flying up to their office in Toronto. They did not reimburse me for 6 months!!! I still hate them, at least the Toronto office, that was the single-handedly worst interview I've given in my life (and I'm comparing to GS/MS/McK/Bain)

There is a reason why they are #47 of the vault i-banking prestige list, proudly lower than US Bancorp Capital Mkts (which I did not even know existed). I would strongly advise against MacQ...
MrCanuck

mr canuck, the vault rankings are bullshit as everyone knows. they include commercial banks. macquarie is a strong name internationally and is growing in prestige in the US. I wouldn't base any decision on the vault rankings. I am sorry you had a bad experience with them, but let me assure you they are not idiots and they can and do close deals. I wouldn't be so quick to assume things about who they hire. you had a bad interview, get over it.

Everything I've heard about MacQ blows. I'll second canucks comment that their bankers are accounting robots who seem to enjoy making kids squirm in interviews by asking impossible questions. It's like those jackass senior frat guys who used to get abused by the frat guys when he was a pledge and now revels in the chance to pass along the tradition of abuse now that it's his turn. Reminds me of Ben Affleck in "Dazed and Confused", minus the fact that Affleck is remotely cool and rather than a wooden paddle they like to hit your ass with a FASB paddle.

Thanks gomes3pc, and I think the point to take away from this discussion board is that MacQuarie is all about numbers. Sure, certain people love numbers and they join private equity groups focused in areas like utilities, airports and toll roads. AND, they actually like their jobs.

But investment banking as an industry is not just about the finance, anyone can learn the finance. It's about sales skills, insider market knowledge, insider industry knowledge and making a competitive bid. Ultimately, the only differentiating factor is reputation, which is based on charisma and previous success. You just can't drive value through financial engineering, those days are long gone.

MacQuarie should make it extremely clear that they are looking for accounting robots. I am not a robot, and there was no need to be so harsh when I interviewed with them. I had number focused interviews with McKinsey (case interview), and they weren't dicks at all. In fact, when I messed up in first rounds, they even corrected my mistakes and told me not to worry. Heck I even got an offer with them! I don't even know why MacQ would interview someone from Cornell. If they wanted people who love excel sheets, walk into your local Deloitte office!
Mr. Canuck

Anyone know how long they take to get back to you after you've taken the psycho test?

so, any insight on how long after the test it takes for them to get back to you?

I didn't get dinged; I didn't even apply after talking with a few guys on the street about their office style and business model. If I was going to be at a MM, I'd much rather be at Cowen, Jefferies, HLHZ, or Piper, to name a few. McQ is just incredibly rigid.

gomes3pc,

You have a incredibly naive view of a much larger bank, just maybe not so in your direct vicinity. Taking what you hear from Chanos and Cramer would be a bad idea, especially since they have a bit of cash on the line. To compare MacBank to those names shows you are off base, they operate in a completely different space.

After the psych they usually get back to you within days. At the smaller offices they often take a little longer.

mac is not a MM, they do almost exclusively large infrastructure deals in the US and are a BB in Australia. they do not compete with those banks. gomes you have no first hand experience with them yet you trash them in this thread. and btw the office style is open, like a trading floor. not even MD's get their own offices. doesn't sound too rigid to me.

I wasn't comparing them to the types of deals. No sh!t they all work in the MM. McQ operates in a different field, and I guess if you want to get into their infrastructure biz they are good. But if you are looking to just get into banking and want to have a good experience, there are plenty of non BBs that I'd rather go to before McQ.

And a BB in Australia? Who cares except the Aussies? Honestly, unless you want to work in the land down under I don't care how good they are there.

I didn't trash them. All I gave was my firsthand experience after talking with HR there as well vets in the industry who I've talked with and asked for their opinion. They are an efficient bank and if you love working with numbers then I can see someone really enjoying it. But me personally and the people I enjoy being around, that's not my thing. The numbers are huge in banking but IMHO the ability to sell is just as great and I don't think you'll get the kind of experience in developing the skills to close a pitch at a place like McQ. You'll know the accounting in and out but not, IMHO, the skills you want if one day you look to go into an exec position at a major bank.

Just my opinion, take it for what it's worth because obviously I haven't worked there. I just am going by what I have learned from my experience and from others working with them or in competition with them.

if your interests lie in working on deals with stable cash flows and vanilla deal structuring, then this place is the place for you...great at what they do and thats infrastructure