How to get a leg up?
This questions is not concerned with prestige, money and exit options.
It is all about the learning aspects. Would an internship with a CPA firm be a good way to prepare for investment banking and allow someone to better understand the word that one is actually doing?
would an internship in investment banking help you in an accounting career?
I would think an investment banking internship would help you for investment banking.
Genius.
The question however is what outside of investment banking can help you with investment banking. Financial modeling obviously involves financial statement and I figured that therefore an internship with a CPA firm would help. Besides, I heard that ex accountants are usually able to contribute a lot in ib.
Any takers?
where did it say outside of investment banking?
can you change your signature? it's annoying as fuck
nope
what a douche
Sorry I figured that everybody would be able to deduce that a ib internship would help prepare for ib. Next time I'll clarify for you. Sorry about that.
please do
Are you talking about a junior year internship? The obvious answer: Look for something more finance-related first, but if things don't work out, I suppose that's the best you have. For sophomore summer or below, it's not too bad, but even PWM is better. Also, by "CPA firm," do you mean local accounting firm (some random partnership down the street), regional player, or best yet the Big 4?
While accounting is important for investment banking, the way auditors think and financial analysts think are very different. In financial reporting or audit, you will learn a lot about how the numbers are derived and get familiar with all the items on the financial statements. However, you won't really get a chance to do much with forward-looking analysis because you're just dealing with past transactions. If you're lucky, at a small firm you might get a chance to help CPAs do "business consulting" for their clients, but I wouldn't count on it. (Some local firms combine accounting/tax, "consulting," and financial planning services.)
Finance cares about what the numbers imply for the future, so it's more for forecasting purposes to establish some kind of value. Accountants do not deal with concepts involving intrinsic value, and certainly don't model. There's a difference between: "Looks like the inventory numbers are correct and reported fairly" and "hmm these inventory turnover ratios do not look so good going forward." Accountants do the former. Definitely take accounting courses, but audit experience does not necessarily help with IB. If you have something better, take it instead. If it's Big 4 audit (and assuming you go to a target and have good grades), you can still interview for IB, but you have to tell a convincing story.
Thanks for the elaborate take on the subject. I already have an offer to do IB FT, but I am looking to prepare myself better for the job. I was thinking that a audit internship could help. I am mainly looking at regional players where I could my hands dirty and really learn.
At the point where I am at, it just seems to me that an audit internship would be more helpful than any other alternative.
Oh, and my opinion of a CPA designation: It's obviously a great credential to have in general (certainly doesn't hurt), but it says "I'm an expert on GAAP" more than it says "I'm an expert on financial statement analysis [for things other than reporting according to GAAP]."
You're going to be tearing through financial statements a lot as an analyst/associate, so knowing your way around them (via CPA) is definitely a huge plus. But it's knowing how to use those numbers in models that separates the men from the boys.
Do you know how much an audit internship would help with understanding the numbers in models? I understand that there's a difference between understanding how statements flow and whether they are correct. I just figured that if you know where everything is coming from, with time you should be able to understand how they flow.
Anybody that moved from accounting to IB, mind elaborating?
fixed it guys. thanks for the heads up
you should respect his wishes and call him muhammad ali
hahaha
It's a party in the USA!
futuramo, if you have the FT offer already, I would say relax and enjoy the rest of your year before the job starts. No need to pursue these kinds of opportunities. If anything, you can review finance topics and maybe get a valuation or Excel reference book, but even that's not really necessary. To prepare for the job, there's training. To prepare for training...well I don't know that many people who really tried to prepare for training lol.
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