3 Hour Competency Test - ER Associate

Mother of god. Who is this for?

3 hours for a competency exam?! better be your dream job

sounds like something monkeysama would fail regards

i'd smile if its a wind up and you've already got the job and it's HR betting who writes the most.

They aren't going to read that many of them if its 3 hours of writing, so its going to be a final few. In that case try and put the obvious down and then find something to stand out. If I'm wrong and there are thousands of fellow nutjobs around you sitting this lolpaper, then don't fail the idiot test.

this sounds wack kid

This is standard operating procedure, you will be given a model and will have to update it for a quarter. Should not be too difficult. Ignore these other posts.

pm me

I've had to do the same thing twice now. 3 hours seems like a longtime but it's not especially if your having to build a model from scratch. My guess is that they will give you an existing analyst's model and a press release and tell you to update it. But to be safe make sure you can build a set of integrated financial statements and a subsequent valuation. Be able to make rational assumptions and be able to example those assumptions.

They are most likely looking to see if you can decipher what is relevant/actionable in the press release and then speak to those points in your writing sample in a succinct/concise way. I was interviewing for a position with an E&P analyst and so I knew I was going to get a press release from an E&P company. So what I did to prepare was to read the earnings call transcripts from a few different companies in that space. I listened most intently to (1) the questions asked by the analysts at the end of transcript - this can help you decipher what is truly of most relevance and (2) the metrics most emphasized in the earnings calls. If you can get a sell-side report from some company in that industry that can helpful in deciding what is important too.

Don't expect to be able to add value with truly insightful points. Most senior analysts don't. Just identify what is important and make rational conclusions and you'll be fine. Good luck. If you need some SS reports send me a message.

do all potential ER candidates have to take these exams? never heard of this before.

Thanks

Are the modeling exams etc. done in the offices? Or is a PR and model emailed to do at home?

judging by this:

What sorts of things besides making sure the b/s balances are important to do?

Also make sure that your cash balance on the BS ties to your cash on the S-CF.

Will I need to build a model from the ground up?

YES you will need to build from the ground up. The key here is to build one NOW, get it to work, and just remember how you did it. That is what you will do in the industry. Trust me, you do not want to be fucking with getting your CF statement to match the BS when you have three hours. I had all day to do one and it was hard to squeeze in. Luckily, I did do what i just told you, and at least had a mental image of what my financial model was going to look like and where the potential pitfalls were before I started. I pretty much just dropped it in and filled it in.

To give you a better idea, I was given this exact thing: "My guess is that they will give you an existing analyst's model and a press release and tell you to update it. "

Which was followed by: " and on the valuation tab (which was blank) use a valuation method of your choice to value the comp.