Intrepid just kicked off their 2026 SA process. Any insight into their current deal flow, culture, comp (base and bonus), exit opps, internal promotions, hours?
Been a while since someone deeply covered Intrepid — a thorough discussion would be greatly appreciated.
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Someone I’m close with used them on a small buy-side. He said their team was terrible and basically almost committed fraud with how bad their modeling was. Not sure if this is helpful for you, but would consider avoiding.
What modeling does a buyside advisor do? I thought that’s the sellside’s job
You’re correct in that the sell-side usually has the pen. Buy-side advisors do model, though. In this instance, not sure what the context was, but I’d imagine some internal scenarios or something
I’m at a boutique mostly doing buyside advisory. It heavily depends on the client but mandates can vary a lot. Buyside advisors like us are often on retainer, so models can be whatever the company is analyzing - whether that’s an M&A idea, capital allocation decisions, quarterly earnings prep, etc.
On deals, it’s similarly variable. I’ve been on deals where we didn’t model at all and just ran diligence because the client had a solid enough corp dev team that didn’t want our help.
On other deals, we may be doing full operating models with multiple scenarios, full on merger math to analyze accretion/dilution and value creation potential of multiple structuring options…the whole shebang.
Have a few big clients ($20b market cap+) that act similar to PE firms with the equivalent of investment committees in their corp. dev., so we may be modeling out IRR and leverage for a potential deal. The Board or a Special Committee will sometimes ask for a buy side fairness opinion also.
All I can say is the LA office seems really fun and I know they're strong in beauty, which is interesting. VP I talked to on the team was super nice.
Same here, interviewed with them awhile back and came away really liking them. Seems to be a good place to be if you’re not into PE and want to be a career banker given comp structure
What is their comp structure like for VP and up?
Did you go through their interview process, or simply a networking call? Any other thoughts?
Thoughts on their new RX team?
Avoid, Skip is a dick that no one likes. I know several ex intrepid folks and all were horribly mistreated by skip. He is a big fan of advancing his son’s career and those of his friends.
I’ve heard they are losing a lot of money and skip finally ran off a few of his big money.
He ran off a ton of his employees as well. I don’t know anyone who has had a good experience there, they all got shit pay relatively and were all miserable.
It sounds like you're referring to Intrepid Financial Partners, which is the Energy focused boutique which Skip McGee runs. I believe this thread is referring to Intrepid Investment Bankers which is an advisory arm of MUFG out of LA (I think).
Would not start a career here
Thanks for the comment -- any particular reasons against it?
eat what you kill comp model (ie below market base salary) is not good as an analyst. and you dont share in the upside.
Can I PM you ?
anyone heard back for second rounds?
They always send irrelevant teasers
On behalf of everyone in energy, fuck skip
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