Tools of the Trade: Pro Tips

Starting this up to compile best-in-class list of banker tools and pro-tricks:

  1. Macabacus Dot com -- best online resource for financial modeling (hands down). Most of it probably too advanced for banking, but sets the industry standard
  2. BamSEC Dot com -- best way to browse filings -- even if you don't pay for it
  3. Mergers & Inquisitions -- good general investment banking guides and some good PE content as well
  4. StreetOfWalls Dot com -- good LBO interviewing & practice materials
  5. LogoIntern Dot com -- best online logo resource (finding and formatting logo slides automatically).

What else belongs on here?

38 Comments
 
Best Response

I haven't @babymonkey357" - honestly, should have used logo intern in the past but just didn't know about it. I've generally just used SEC EDGAR for filings, you can also get the same excel download there. The advantage of BAM SEC seems to be the ability to search across company filings, and I honestly just haven't needed that functionality in my prior roles. As far as macabacus add-ins, I think the TTS plugin is probably comparable.

For charts in PPT, I've used the thinkcell plugin as well. It's aggravating in that it seems to suck up processor speed (slow to move around), but relatively intuitive from a user interface perspective for formatting.

 

I am a big fan of the macabacus plug-in for Excel - convinced my shop to buy it for me when I first joined, it's relatively inexpensive and saves a ton of time. You can setup your own custom shortcuts and it has an awesome trace precedents/dependents tool (with ability to evaluate functions and groups, and even offsets).

I know two buddies whose shops have actually started buying macabacus pro for all of their associates now.

 

Most videos on the site are free (the only ones that aren't are the quizzes and a select few about deeper modelling stuff which is found on macabacus anyway). It's honestly a great start, I used it because I found macabus quite challenging at first and it worked pretty well in giving me a basic understanding of modelling

 

Logointern add-in has been a big help. We recently got that installed.

I've heard of groups looking at tombstone offerings, but haven't seen anything myself.

 

What about all these AI tools that always seem to be just around the corner. Do any actually exist, either inhouse/proprietary to a firm, or made by third parties? And are they any good?

 

My bank is partnering with some tech company to explore developing some new CRM system for bankers... basically our current CRM is crap and they got it set up ~18 months ago after a hefty review process and everyone hates it.

 

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