Financial And Valuation Modeling Wall Street Prep

[Riley Dyen]

FinancialModeling is an integral part of what you do in finance in general and banking in particular. In fact, it might be all you do for the first few years of your career. Setting yourself apart during the recruitment or internship process is crucial given the severe disparity between available roles and candidate volume. As always, a good academic pedigree will go a long way, but there are other ways to boost your chances.

All the courses in this list will help you learn financial modeling, but they each offer something extra as well. That extra something might be brand value or having a classroom experience or perhaps real-world case studies. Hopefully, this article can help you pick the one that you need to make it in finance.

Financial modelling is a core skill that you will need to master for most financial roles. Its so fundamental to success early on in your career, that it should be the first thing to focus on and become an expert right away. Whenever anyone at your firm even thinks about a financial model, your name should pop into their heads at a subconscious level.

I realize that all sounds a bit excessive, but I just want to stress how fundamental this skill is to your finance career. Especially early on when you are preparing for the selection process or as an analyst. And this is the package that you want if you want to go full beast mode with financial modelling.

There is a lot of solid content here. From financial statement modelling to DCF modelling, from M&A modelling to trading comps modelling and from transaction comps modelling to LBO modelling. Almost all financial courses, including university coursework, cover some amount of modelling but WSP is delivering things from a more practical, real industry perspective. Its less of academic theory and more of I-am-sitting-at-my-desk-and-need-to-make-this model-by-end-of-day.

The practical experience of the authors shines through in most of the videos and those are the little things that you should really grab on to while you take this course. After a decade and half in finance, there are certain things that my brain automatically filters out as fluff and certain things I know are important. And I can tell you, there is not a lot of fluff in this course. They are indeed dropping gold nuggets most of the time.

Banking and Finance are by no means easy-to-get roles. You need something to stand out and the FMVA offers the best brand recognition and CV value, in my opinion, when it comes to Financial Modeling. Its offered by the Corporate Finance Institute which has built a name for itself with this popular certification program.

The curriculum is divided into a series of optional, required and elective courses. This modular structure is something that I really like as it means you can pick and choose the courses you want based on your skill level and experience. Need an intro to Corporate Finance? Take the optional Corporate Finance prep course. Already know Excel? Skip that elective. Such options are always nice.

The bulk of the electives are related to financial modeling and Excel. You learn everything you need to learn to prepare for a modeling interview. You start with the foundational courses which includes business valuation modeling, budgeting and forecasting, scenario and sensitivity analysis, power point and pitchbooks etc.

There are plenty of case studies to sink your teeth into and the focus on real world practical skills instead of just academic understanding is really welcome. That should be expected as the course has been made by our fellow bankers with plenty of experience in the field.

Financial Edge is an elite training provider that provides in-house training to bankers at some of the worlds top investment banks. These are the people that investment banks turn to when they need to train their people. That should give you a sense as to the quality they offer and the reputation they have built. The best part is that because of their name recognition in the finance world, a certification from Financial Edge is well-recognized in the industry and that alone can open up a lot of doors for you.

The course material is well design and structured with plenty of videos to explain the content. There are over 50 practical exercises fro you to sink your teeth into. That should be more than enough to give you the confidence you need to hack away at those models in the real world. It is this practical focus that makes this course so highly recommended. Academic theory is good, but real world practice is better. You have to complete an online quiz to complete each module and earn your certification. You can use this certification to spruce up your LinkedIn profile and showcase your skills to potential recruiters or your boss.

This course will get you desk ready for any Financial Modeling role. The course is suitable for beginners as it lays the foundations before getting into the thick of things. It provides a smooth learning slope and takes it time to get the concepts across.

Wharton has brought out the big guns with this course and it carries some serious brand value. You get a completion certificate that it will add some serious pop to both your CV and LinkedIn profile. Yes, that is important enough to be mentioned right at the top of this list.

The course quality itself is excellent and the modules are delivered by top Wharton faculty. There is indeed a focus on finance, and it covers everything from spreadsheet modeling, investment analysis and company valuation to forecasting, decision making and scenario analysis.

This is one of the best and most comprehensive courses you will find on financial modeling. The New York Institute of Finance produces very high-quality courses for finance professionals, and this one really belongs at the top of the pile.

You get hands-on guidance from industry experts in a virtual/ physical classroom environment. This really adds to the overall learning experience in my opinion. Probably because having other students around you (even if via a video link) makes learners more competitive and committed.

You start off an advanced excel course followed by modeling and then three full days spent on valuations. Its pretty comprehensive and should be more than enough for any analyst looking to get into finance or making a lateral move.

This course has been designed for junior to mid level finance professionals and analysts. Its a combination of accounting, finance, business metrics and spreadsheet skills to help you critically analyze a business strategy over both short and long terms.

You will learn to use Excel effectively for financial modeling including several advanced functions. You will deal with accounting statements including relationships between them, how to build them, what ratios to look at, how to forecast for future periods, how to use historical data correctly, how to interpret various numbers, how to resolve ambiguities.

I highly recommend downloading the course brochure to get a feel for what you need to learn when it comes to financial modeling. In addition to what I have already mentioned, you also focus on sensitivity and scenario analysis, modeling businesses, decision making , valuation and so on. Almost everything you need to know as a financial modeler is covered here in some shape or form.

Udemy has several nice, smaller courses that can help you fill the gaps in your understanding of financial modeling. These are smaller, more focused courses that will help you focus on specific areas.

This is an intermediate level course meant for more advanced learners or those applying to more quantitative roles within finance. You learn more advanced functions as well as new tricks to help you get your modeling done faster.

This course shares some material from the other Wharton Course on this list but this one is targeted towards business analysts in general who have to perform financial modeling as part of their day-to-day.

The course starts off by laying the foundation of quantitative modeling and spreadsheets. In the second half of the course, you focus on financial concepts like cash reporting, income statements, forecasting, time value of money, the risk-return tradeoff, cost of capital, interest rates, retirement savings, mortgage financing, capital budgeting, asset valuation, discounted cash flow (DCF) analysis, net present value, internal rate of return, hurdle rate, payback period and so on.

The courses have been ranked based on the above criteria. The aim is to allow finance professionals better prepare for the hiring process including CV building with strong brands, interview preparation and hitting the ground running on Day 1 of your internship/ job.

This boot camp is an intensive virtual training program where trainees learn financial and valuation modeling in Excel using an intuitive, step-by-step approach. Participants will use real case studies to build financial models from scratch the way it is done at financial institutions. The program is a synthesis of Excel modeling, navigating through various financial reports, and the application of accounting, corporate finance, and valuation courses.

You will develop a 3-statement model completely from scratch, inputting historical data and assumptions to project out financial statements by selecting, locating, and developing appropriate projection drivers.

Participants learn how to value the company step-by-step, including how to estimate the weighted average cost of capital (WACC) in the real world, how to implement commonly used approaches to calculating terminal value, and how to use data tables to analyze a broad range of scenarios given different assumptions.

Virtual training runs daily from 9am to 5pm. The day will be filled with interactive exercises as learners move back and forth between classroom lecture, small group breakout rooms, competitions and 1-on-1 interaction.

This seminar presumes knowledge of financial accounting (at least 1 semester or equivalent). Participants without this background must enroll in and complete the Accounting Crash Course prior to attending the seminar.

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