“I recently had a LinkedIn audit call with Arnau as part of my WSO Academy program, and it was one of the most practical and useful sessions I've had so far. I came in thinking my profile was in decent shape. I left with a clear picture of how recruiters and bankers actually see it, and a concrete list of changes that will make it work much harder for me.
Some background: I'm moving from corporate finance into investment banking, corporate banking, and private equity. I have an MBA in Corporate Finance, a PMP, and several years of finance and project management experience. Making that kind of move depends heavily on how you present your story, and LinkedIn is often the first place a recruiter or analyst sees it. That's why this session mattered so much to me.
From the first few minutes, Arnau was well prepared, direct, and focused on what actually moves the needle. He didn't just give generic tips like "add a professional photo." He went through my profile section by section and explained why each piece matters to someone in finance who's quickly scanning candidates. His feedback was honest without being discouraging, which I really appreciated. He pointed out where my profile was underselling my experience and where it wasn't clearly showing that I'm aiming for banking and PE.
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1) precedent transactions - synergies 2) DCF - terminal value often higher than reality 3) comps. - no synergies
As for beta's, is there another way? I certainly don't know one, unless you want to regress returns of the firm versus the market, which is stupid because you want an industry beta.
NOL questions should be answered like typical 'flow' questions related to accounting... nothing really too difficult here
Same as previously mentioned (Transaction Comps first), although I don't think I'd say 'synergies', but transaction premiums that can be related to synergies and also pricing premium related to gaining elements of control (not really sure about the relationship between Comps / DCF)
You can actually compute beta through regression, but I don't think this is typically done (not sure - haven't worked in IB). Go out an grab betas for each company, un-lever them (strip out the effects of cap. structure), and average them, and then re-lever w/ the target cap. structure of the company you're valuing.
1.) NOLs just affects the value of Deferred Tax Liabilities (or DTAs if you choose that instead) on the BS, and consequently its change will be reflected in the CFS.
2.) Generally the highest valuation will usually be given by precendent transactions, then followed by either the DCF or public comps. Technically the DCF could have the highest valuation if you input an extremely high exit multiple or terminal growth rate.
3.) No investment banker working in advisory will try to calculate standalone beta - you just get it off bloomberg terminal. The act of un-levering and re-levering is used to calculate cost of equity, or more commonly known as CAPM.
Thanks. For the calculation of the cost of equity, do we use the beta from bloomberg directly? Why do we bother un-levering and re-levering betas of comparable companies if we have already known the beta from bloomberg?
Bloomberg's beta is by regression, they also provide an adjusted beta which is just 30% of 1 (long-term market beta) and 70% of the normal beta.
You can think of beta from this example as stock prices. The regressed beta is like your current share price, where as getting a beta from peers is like doing comparables to see what the implied beta should be. I just read this section in BIWS
The listed beta reflects the company's current capital structure, and if you're using beta in the context of calculating a cost of equity for the WACC in a DCF then you'd want to use the target capital structure (not necessarily the one the company currently has) so this is one reason why you'd go through the process of pulling a beta then un-levering, and re-levering
FYI from your posts I get the impression that you're trying to get really granular w/ your technical prep, and it's definitely good. But, based on your questions you might need to go back and do a better job of understanding the components of each question.
Agree with BepBep12, I remember Brian explains this very clearly in the videos. You're probably moving on too fast, just watching the videos instead of really studying them. Just follow this formula:
=IF(would i be able to lecture the material in last lesson to a class? = 1, move on to next video, restudy last lesson).
I would agree with the sentiment that it would be useful to go over basics in more depth, but just to answer the NOL question explicitly:
Suppose the NOL used was $100...
Income Statement: no change, NOL changes cash taxes paid but has no impact on accrual of expenses for the period
Statement of Cash Flows: starting point (net income) is the same, recognize savings (increase) of $100 in cash flows from operations because you paid less taxes
Balance sheet: deferred tax assets down $100, cash up $100: changes in Assets offset. Liabilities and Stockholder's Equity unchanged, so we balance.
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No dude, not at all man. You might want to re-visit this; otherwise, good luck in your interview.
I see now. I didn't read all the responses. I thought he was talking about using levered beta to estimate a firm beta instead of equity beta.
NOL carry-forward will create a deferred tax asset, and thus create an income statement event in the form of a deferred tax expense. The dte will also touch the SoCFs in order to net out the effect on the I/S. Obviously a dta/l will change the BS.
So how does a $100 change in DTA affect the three statements? Does it impact the IS or not, there have been conflicting answers here...
Let's say DTA increases by $100. DTA increase hits the BS, step one done.
Journal entry for a DTA increase:
DTA 100 (d) DTE 100 (c)
DTE will hit the income statement, and will also have to be added back/subtracted from net income using the indirect method of Statement of Cash Flows.
B/S? Yes. I/S? Yes. SoCFs? Yes.
Thanks a lot! Sorry to keep pushing, but I just wanted to know:
Won't the $100 DTE be affected by tax on the IS (i.e. net income doesn't change by $100)?
I know all 3 statements would be affected, but it would be helpful to see the exact breakdown, as it is not available in any of the guides or Google-able.
No problem, happy to help.
As the journal entry stated, an increase in DTA will have to be balanced out by crediting DTE. Since DTE is an expense account, the normal balance should be a debit. Therefore, an increase in DTA, will actually increase net income, for it is reducing the amount of Total Taxes Paid.
Here's a helpful formula for the tax part: Total Tax Provision (what shows up on the IS) = Current Tax Expense +- Change in DTA/DTL
Current Tax Expense is Taxable Income x Statutory Tax Rate the delta DTA/DTL will come from the difference between the financial income and the taxable, and also any other DTAs created (such as when a NOL is carried-forward).
In our problem, the DTE is a credit balance, eating into CTE, and reducing Total Tax Expense. Naturally, the DTA hit the BS by debiting DTA by 10 (whether it is current or non-current depends on the expected time frame the NOL will vanish by profitable operations). The Income Statement will be hit via a reduction in Provision for Income Taxes, and the Statement of Cash Flows will also be hit in order to net out the effect the DTE had on the net income.
If you have any other questions, I'd be glad to help.
Thanks! In BIWS, it said:
"create a book vs. cash tax schedule where you calculate the Taxable Income based on NOLs, and then look at what you would pay in taxes without the NOLs. Then you book the difference as an increase to the Deferred Tax Liability on the Balance Sheet."
Does it mean that we use Income-NOL and subtract T*income? How does that make sense? How will the increase in DTL affect the three statement?
Also, for DTA, if the NOL last year was 10$, then do we record that as a $4 DTA assuming T=40%?
There is so much misinformation above that I'm not even going to bother. Just understand that book taxes (what's shown in filings) is different from cash taxes (how much you actually pay). NOLs only affect cash taxes, not book taxes.
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