Mergers & Acquisitions Transactions

The purpose of this course is to provide you with an overview of M&A strategies and an introduction to the structuring and accounting for deals. We will also learn how to model M&A transactions. This is an advanced and technical course. If reviewing arcane accounting and tax rules does not bring you joy, you are forewarned! You will see plenty of both in the course. During the course, we will focus on several themes:
1. Deal strategy
2. Deal valuations
3. Deal structuring – impact of tax and accounting rules
4. Common metrics used to evaluate deals and limitations of those metrics
5. Accounting and modeling of deals

This course is recommended for those who intend to work in the financial services area – it will be helpful for those looking for a career in banking, corporate advisory services, treasury or corporate/financial strategy.

Advising on M&A transactions requires a strong background in accounting and tax. This course will get into the minutiae of various accounting and tax aspects of M&A. I will expect you to be willing to do the deep dive, where required. It is expected that you
have already taken courses in financial accounting and corporate finance and are interested in accounting and tax. If you do not have a prior background in accounting and tax, you are strongly advised to check with the instructor before enrolling in this
course.

This is not a course in excel, excel tools/techniques or about excel add‐ins provided by data providers. There are many services provided by data providers and Wall Street Prep companies for those. This course will focus on the accounting, finance and
economics of evaluating deals and building models. Also, we assume that you are already proficient in Excel, since we will use a lot of Excel models in the course.