M&A - Have I idealized this job? Or am I just in the wrong place?
Hello guys, I'm from Southern Europe and I currently work in a small advisory firm that decided to hire me when I was still finishing my Master's degree in Finance. In my country, IB is not an attractive sector and the big I-banks hire a very limited number of people. That's why I decided to accept their offer.
Theoretically, the role was about being part of the small M&A team of this firm. However, I feel like that all I am doing right now is about accouting. I thought I would do business valuation (DCF, Multiples, etc), I would be preparing company teasers for transactions, making models about potential transactions and stuff like that.
What I'm actually doing is a TON of budgeting and business planning. All I do is looking at balance sheets and income statements, call CFOs and financial controllers in order to ask clarifications about some entry, preparing budgets and business plans. It's been already a year I'm working here, I saw only one DCF valuation model.
My questions are:
- How much is different being an M&A analyst in a big bank or in a Big4?
- How much is important knowing accouting for IB? I know one should know the main concepts about a balance sheet, but I wasn't expecting I was needed a CPA level knowledge (and by the way, all my colleagues and partners of this firm have the CPA license). Frankly speaking, I don't really like accounting and all this situation is making me question whether this is the right career for me.
Am I in the wrong place? Or maybe I was simply extremely naive about what to expect from this job?
Thanks for the help.
Probably both. I work at a large bank and I can tell you this is not an issue as public corporations have standardized accounting practices for the most part. You only really run into these problems with small private business and CFOs who have their own “unique” bookkeeping systems so you tend to double as your client’s accountant. That being said, accounting is an important part of the job but you definitely do not need to have CPA level knowledge. I’m speaking generally as I know banks in Europe like to take laterals from Big4 so maybe there’s a cultural emphasis on being more fluent in accounting.
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