What's The Big Deal?

Wall Street Prep
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Get the view from the inside. Every week, Graham Smith (ex-Ares) and Deborah Taylor (ex-Barclays) take a look at Wall Street’s headline-grabbing deals.  From mega-mergers and hostile takeovers to complex private credit transactions, they break down the why, the how, and the who behind the numbers.

  1. 6日前 ·  ビデオ

    Can Claude's AI Agents Build a Better M&A Model than Investment Bankers?

    This week Debs and Graham run the numbers on the proposed Union Pacific and Norfolk Southern merger, a deal that would create a $250bn rail network. Debs built a short form merger model for it, and how she built it is the real story. Fable burns through tokens fast, so Debs asked Claude to delegate the build: Sonnet for the data mining and consensus estimates, Fable for planning and structure, Opus to stress test the logic at the end, with Claude supplying the prompts for each handover. Switching models manually in the Excel add-in is clunky, but it worked and she never hit her token limit. Timestamps: 00:00 — Cold open 00:43 — Intro: the Union Pacific and Norfolk Southern deal 01:48 — Why US rail is the way it is 04:03 — Delegating the build to Claude's agents 05:13 — A word from Wall Street Prep 05:45 — Which tasks go to Sonnet, which to Opus 06:58 — Why the Excel add-in makes this clunky 11:21 — Inside the merger model 12:51 — $2.75bn of synergies: material or punchy? 14:45 — Asset step ups and the tax treatment 16:22 — EPS accretion and pro forma leverage 19:33 — Reprompting live for standalone leverage 20:19 — Why the sensitivity tables are so hard to audit 22:23 — So is the deal any good? Topics covered: → Using Fable as an orchestrator and delegating to Sonnet and Opus → Which tasks are worth delegating, and what the handovers cost in tokens → Building a short form merger model in the Excel add-in → Consideration mix, synergies and whether $2.75bn is punchy → EPS accretion, pro forma leverage and why the two go together → Asset step ups, and why they don't help in a stock deal → Where the model falls short: standalone leverage, data tables → Whether the deal itself is actually interesting Why Wall Street Prep? Wall Street Prep is the trusted training provider for the world's top investment banks, private equity firms, Fortune 1000 companies and business schools. Our online training and instructor-led boot camps are direct adaptations of our corporate training, making Wall Street Prep the ideal choice for those looking to break into finance. DISCLAIMER: The information provided in this video is for educational and entertainment purposes only and does not constitute financial, investment, tax, or legal advice. Investing involves risk, and you may lose some or all of your capital. Past performance is not indicative of future results. Please conduct your own due diligence or consult with a certified professional before making any financial decisions. Financial & Valuation Modeling Certification Program Premium Package (DISCOUNT CODE: WTBD): https://www.wallstreetprep.com/self-study-programs/premium-package/ WTBD Newsletter:  https://webmail.wallstreetprep.com/whats-the-big-deal Socials: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/wall-street-prep/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/wallstreetprep/ Resources: https://linktr.ee/wallstreetprep

  2. 8月20日 ·  ビデオ

    Investing With Claude AI: Screening the S&P 500 to Find Undervalued Stocks

    This week Debs and Graham build an investment screen with Claude and run it across the S&P 500. The prompt was two lines: produce a value and momentum screen, pull fundamentals from the SEC API and market data from a free source. Claude chose the factors, built the scoring and generated the dashboard. Debs, who is quick to point out she is not a coder, did the setup in Power Query. The screen ranks every company on earnings yield, book to price, EBITDA to EV, sales to EV and free cash flow yield, then blends those with one, three and six month price momentum into a composite score. Value on its own finds cheap stocks and some of those are cheap for a reason, so momentum is one way of filtering out the value trap. Debs is direct about where a screen still needs a human. The factor set punishes banks and insurers, which do not report a comparable EBITDA and score zero regardless of quality. Some multiple calculations need checking before you would rely on them. And the output is a shortlist to research, not a portfolio to buy. Timestamps: 00:00 — Intro 01:11 — What an investment screen is 02:28 — A word from Wall Street Prep 03:47 — Value and momentum styles 06:01 — The two line prompt 09:11 — "I am not a coder" 10:44 — The factors Claude chose 13:22 — Z scores and composite ranking 17:39 — The dashboard and your factor tilt 19:50 — Private markets vs public markets 24:38 — Retail investors and trading platforms 26:31 — What institutions still have that you don't Topics covered: → What an investment screen is and why investors use one → Building a value and momentum screen from a two line prompt → The factors Claude chose and why value alone is not enough → Z scores, composite ranking and adjusting factor weights → Where factor choices exclude viable companies → Why a screen is a starting point, not a buy list → Backtesting, alpha and systematic strategies → Retail investors connecting screens to trading platforms → What institutions still have: proprietary data and trading costs Why Wall Street Prep? Wall Street Prep is the trusted training provider for the world's top investment banks, private equity firms, Fortune 1000 companies and business schools.  Our online training and instructor-led boot camps are direct adaptations of our corporate training, making Wall Street Prep the ideal choice for those looking to break into finance. DISCLAIMER: The information provided in this video is for educational and entertainment purposes only and does not constitute financial, investment, tax, or legal advice.  Investing involves risk, and you may lose some or all of your capital. Past performance is not indicative of future results. Please conduct your own due diligence or consult with a certified professional before making any financial decisions. Financial & Valuation Modeling Certification Program Premium Package (DISCOUNT CODE: WTBD): https://www.wallstreetprep.com/self-study-programs/premium-package/ WTBD Newsletter:  https://webmail.wallstreetprep.com/whats-the-big-deal Socials: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/wall-street-prep/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/wallstreetprep/ Resources: https://linktr.ee/wallstreetprep

  3. 8月13日 ·  ビデオ

    How to Build INSANE Stock Research Dashboards with Claude

    Graham and Deborah build a full stock research dashboard from scratch using Claude, then use it to take apart a company's latest quarterly results in real time. The data comes straight from SEC EDGAR, the build runs off a single prompt and some back-and-forth, and the output is the kind of analysis that used to need an expensive terminal and a team behind it. The test case is SpaceX's first quarter as a public company, a business with enough contradictions to push an AI-built dashboard to its limits. Revenue beat expectations and the stock fell anyway, so Graham aims the dashboard at the why: cash burn against revenue, how little of the CapEx bill operations actually cover, and whether the $100bn revenue figure management keeps citing survives contact with what the quarter implies. Deborah works the analyst's angle. Where the numbers need manual checking before you trust them, where a run-rate multiple needs context, and the quality-of-earnings question under a headline adjusted EBITDA number leaning on stock-based comp add-backs. They also cover what a dashboard like this leaves out for a genuine investment decision, from share-price context to the market data a portfolio manager would want next to the fundamentals. The broader theme is access: the tooling that used to be the moat is getting cheap fast, and both hosts weigh what that means for anyone running their own research, retail investors included. Neither would trade on the output yet, but neither dismisses where it's heading. Key Discussion Points: Building a live earnings dashboard with Claude Code and free SEC EDGAR data.  How fast the cash is going: free cash flow against revenue and a $100bn balance.  Why operations covered only 12% of CapEx and where the rest came from.  The $100bn revenue claim against the $31.3bn the quarter implies.  CapEx at 6.4x depreciation as a growth-stage signal.  The stock-based comp add-back debate and the widening adjusted-EBITDA wedge.  What the dashboard is missing for a real investment call.  The democratization of financial data and what it means for retail investors. Why Wall Street Prep? Wall Street Prep is the trusted training provider for the world's top investment banks, private equity firms, Fortune 1000 companies and business schools.  Our online training and instructor-led boot camps are direct adaptations of our corporate training, making Wall Street Prep the ideal choice for those looking to break into finance. DISCLAIMER: The information provided in this video is for educational and entertainment purposes only and does not constitute financial, investment, tax, or legal advice. Investing involves risk, and you may lose some or all of your capital.  Past performance is not indicative of future results. Please conduct your own due diligence or consult with a certified professional before making any financial decisions. Financial & Valuation Modeling Certification Program Premium Package (DISCOUNT CODE: WTBD): https://www.wallstreetprep.com/self-study-programs/premium-package/ WTBD Newsletter:  https://webmail.wallstreetprep.com/whats-the-big-deal Socials: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/wall-street-prep/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/wallstreetprep/ Resources: https://linktr.ee/wallstreetprep

  4. 8月6日 ·  ビデオ

    Can Claude Build an Investment-Banking Grade 3-Statement Model in Excel?

    Graham asked Fable 5 for a five-year three-statement operating model on Lululemon.  A few short paragraphs of instruction: where to pull historic results from, where to source forecasts, what structure to use, which levers matter for a retailer with stores, inventory and an active restructuring plan. What came back was more than a set of forecasts. Claude split revenue by geography rather than product segment, having worked out that the Americas, China and rest of world story matters more for this business than menswear versus womenswear.  It chose INDEX over CHOOSE for scenario selection without being asked. It flagged share buybacks so the diluted share count wouldn't distort EPS. It broke out operating leases separately, which matters when a retailer can grow its store base through leases instead of CapEx. It also wasn't flawless. Debs caught a scenario gap in the depreciation logic and a judgment call on deferred revenue that a research analyst would handle with a dedicated schedule. Topics covered: → Why revenue got split by geography instead of product segment → INDEX vs CHOOSE and why unprompted formula choices matter → The readme tab: giving an agent persistent context so the file becomes a living document → Three genuine scenario cases rather than plus or minus 100 basis points → Where the D&A logic breaks when you flex the CapEx case → The deferred revenue treatment Debs would have built differently → Why the Excel API can't create a data table and what Claude did instead → Both grades and why Graham thinks Debs was harsh Why Wall Street Prep? Wall Street Prep is the trusted training provider for the world's top investment banks, private equity firms, Fortune 1000 companies and business schools.  Our online training and instructor-led boot camps are direct adaptations of our corporate training, making Wall Street Prep the ideal choice for those looking to break into finance. DISCLAIMER: The information provided in this video is for educational and entertainment purposes only and does not constitute financial, investment, tax, or legal advice. Investing involves risk, and you may lose some or all of your capital.  Past performance is not indicative of future results. Please conduct your own due diligence or consult with a certified professional before making any financial decisions. Financial & Valuation Modeling Certification Program Premium Package (DISCOUNT CODE: WTBD): https://www.wallstreetprep.com/self-study-programs/premium-package/ WTBD Newsletter:  https://webmail.wallstreetprep.com/whats-the-big-deal Socials: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/wall-street-prep/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/wallstreetprep/ Resources: https://linktr.ee/wallstreetprep

  5. 7月30日 ·  ビデオ

    Claude for Investment Banking: Building a One-Pager in PowerPoint with AI

    Graham has a confession: he hates PowerPoint. Always has. The late nights at Lehman Brothers lining up charts pixel by pixel. The IC memos that never end. And when he recently tried using Claude Opus to build slides, his words were blunt: "they looked like cr*p." So this week, he and Debs gave Anthropic's newest model, Fable 5, one sentence and a template. Build an investment banking style company overview for Nvidia. No test runs. No preparation. The result was a genuine split decision. Formatting earned an A from both Debs and Graham: clean, well-aligned, properly labeled with units and sources. The basics that junior analysts routinely forget were all handled correctly. Content was a different story. Graham gave it a B-plus. Debs was harsher: a C. The overview covered Nvidia at a high level but lacked segmental revenue breakdown, forward estimates, and what Graham described as "emotion." The conversation that followed was arguably more interesting than the output itself.  Graham argued that PowerPoint might actually outlast Excel as a day-to-day skill in finance: even after you stop building models, you never stop editing IC memos and pitch materials.  Debs made the case for reusable prompt "skills," pre-prepared instructions that teams can share and iterate on, as the practical path to getting first-pass results from AI that are actually usable. Debs's closing verdict: "I think this is a superb use of AI in investment banking workflow."  Not because the output was perfect, but because the tedious formatting work is exactly what AI should be handling. Key Discussion Points: Graham's confession: why he hates PowerPoint and what Opus produced when he tried it.  The Fable 5 test: one prompt, one template, no preparation.  The split verdict: formatting A, content B-plus/C.  Why the output "lacks emotion" and what that means for AI-generated materials.  PowerPoint as a career-long skill: Graham's argument that it outlasts Excel.  The skills approach: how banks are building reusable prompt libraries. Why Wall Street Prep? Wall Street Prep is the trusted training provider for the world's top investment banks, private equity firms, Fortune 1000 companies and business schools.  Our online training and instructor-led boot camps are direct adaptations of our corporate training, making Wall Street Prep the ideal choice for those looking to break into finance. DISCLAIMER: The information provided in this video is for educational and entertainment purposes only and does not constitute financial, investment, tax, or legal advice.  Investing involves risk, and you may lose some or all of your capital.  Past performance is not indicative of future results. Please conduct your own due diligence or consult with a certified professional before making any financial decisions. Financial & Valuation Modeling Certification Program Premium Package (DISCOUNT CODE: WTBD): https://www.wallstreetprep.com/self-study-programs/premium-package/ WTBD Newsletter:  https://webmail.wallstreetprep.com/whats-the-big-deal Socials: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/wall-street-prep/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/wallstreetprep/ Resources: https://linktr.ee/wallstreetprep

  6. 7月23日 ·  ビデオ

    Did Claude Fable 5 Just Solve Private Equity?

    Stripe and Advent have proposed a $50+ billion take-private acquisition of PayPal. It's a mega deal that doesn't fit neatly into any traditional M&A category.  Stripe is the private payments giant.  Advent is one of the largest global PE firms. PayPal is a public payments company with $33 billion in revenue.  And the combined transaction is arguably too big for a traditional buyout, which is exactly what makes it interesting. In this episode, Debs and Graham dig into what makes this deal different, then put Anthropic's newest model, Fable 5, to the test on building an LBO model for the transaction.  Graham walks through why this isn't a standard LBO: rather than a private equity firm buying PayPal outright, Advent is partnering with Stripe to fund the equity portion, taking an ownership stake in the combined group.  That hybrid structure is becoming more common at the mega end of the market where traditional buyouts run into scale constraints. Graham also flags a specific complication with payments companies: not all of PayPal's cash is available for financing the deal.  Payment companies hold customer cash to settle transactions, which sits on the balance sheet but isn't operational cash.  Fable 5 catches this nuance early, suggesting a $3 billion minimum cash floor and excluding customer funds from the financing calculation.  That's the kind of judgment call that separates a first-year analyst model from a professional one. The Fable 5 output produces a working LBO model with specific assumptions: five times leverage split three-to-two between term loan B and senior notes, a 30% purchase premium to the current PayPal share price, a five-year hold period, and a 20% tax rate.  The base case returns come out at $66 billion exit equity value against $24 billion at close, generating 2.75x money multiple and 22.4% IRR. Debs and Graham walk through whether those assumptions are too cautious (they're using lower leverage than the actual proposed transaction), what a higher purchase price would do to returns, and where the standalone LBO framing doesn't fully reflect what the actual deal is trying to accomplish. The episode closes with a promise to revisit as the deal evolves: the $60.5 initial offer has been rejected, negotiations continue, and the combined group structure will reveal more about Stripe and Advent's real thinking on equity returns. Watch this space. Key Discussion Points: The Stripe/Advent/PayPal deal: what's been proposed and where it standsWhy this isn't a traditional LBO: partnering with a private company as buyerThe customer cash complication in payments company M&AThe platform-play thesis: private equity's mega-deal strategy in 2026Fable 5's LBO model: five times leverage, 100% cash sweepThe verdict: $66B exit equity value, 22.4% IRR at base caseWhere the assumptions might need adjustmentWhat the standalone LBO framing doesn't capture about the real dealWhat's the Big Deal? is an educational podcast covering deals and market developments in public and private markets. Nothing in this episode constitutes financial advice. Financial & Valuation Modeling Certification Program Premium Package (DISCOUNT CODE: WTBD): https://www.wallstreetprep.com/self-study-programs/premium-package/ WTBD Newsletter:  https://webmail.wallstreetprep.com/whats-the-big-deal Socials: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/wall-street-prep/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/wallstreetprep/ Resources: https://linktr.ee/wallstreetprep

  7. 7月16日 ·  ビデオ

    Investment Banking: Claude Fable 5 Just One-Shotted a Bulge Bracket-Grade DCF

    Six weeks ago, Debs and Graham asked Claude Opus to build a DCF. The result got a B-minus from Graham and a C from Debs. Missed calculations, questionable assumptions, no clear reasoning on why it was cutting corners.  This week they ran the exact same test — same prompt, same company, no additional guidance — on Anthropic's newest model, Fable 5. The result was a step-change neither Graham or Debs expected. In this episode, Debs and Graham walk through the Fable 5 output in detail. Mid-year discounting handled correctly from the start ("it actually knows how investment bankers think").  Terminal value presented in two methods, perpetuity growth and EBITDA multiple, side by side. Weighted average cost of capital coming in at 10.6%, in line with typical investment banking assumptions.  Diluted share count calculated correctly with buybacks accounted for. The model even self-corrected mid-build when it detected a formula error. The Lululemon test produced a striking finding: the DCF implied 45% upside to the current share price, suggesting the market may have Lululemon materially wrong.  Six weeks ago, Claude Opus solved for a value in line with the current share price. This time, Fable 5 took a genuine view — it saw upside and said so. They also cover the broader context: CVC's Wall Street Journal-covered use of an AI agent in the Sproutz sale process, what that means for banker fees, and Graham's real-world observation that AI has moved from being a calculator to genuinely forming views on valuations. The verdict: A-minus from Graham, B-plus from Debs.  Graham's honest closing question: at $50 in credits per model, is DIY still faster? Fable 5's fate as Anthropic transitions it to usage-only pricing is genuinely uncertain, but the six-week leap the episode captures is not. Key Discussion Points: The six-week transformation: from B-minus/C on Claude Opus to A-minus/B-plus on Fable 5.  What Fable 5 is: Anthropic's newest release, its release history, and its credit-limited launch.  Mid-year discounting, terminal value approaches, and WACC calculations Fable 5 handled correctly.  The self-correction moment: AI detecting and fixing its own mid-build error.  The Lululemon finding: 45% implied upside to the current share price.  AI going from calculator to view-taker: what that shift means for how models should be used.  CVC's Sproutz sale process: AI agent in the data room, and what it signals for banker fees.  The debt-treatment miss: Fable 5's blind spot on lease liabilities.  The economic question: at $50 in credits per model, is DIY still faster? Financial & Valuation Modeling Certification Program Premium Package (DISCOUNT CODE: WTBD): https://www.wallstreetprep.com/self-study-programs/premium-package/ WTBD Newsletter:  https://webmail.wallstreetprep.com/whats-the-big-deal Socials: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/wall-street-prep/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/wallstreetprep/ Resources: https://linktr.ee/wallstreetprep

  8. 7月9日

    Private Equity Faces a 9-Year Backlog. Here's Why.

    US private equity firms now face a 9-year backlog of unsold portfolio companies at the current pace, according to new PwC and PitchBook analysis. Roughly 13,500 companies sit in PE portfolios as of June 30, with nearly 4,000 held for 6+ years and 1,500 held for 9+ years.  Fundraising has collapsed alongside, with only $159.6 billion raised in H1, on track to match 2025's muted total. In this episode, Debs and Graham dig into Bain's private equity report and unpack the structural pressures behind the slowdown, which explain why financial sponsor transaction volume is down 9% year-on-year even as broader deal activity has hit records. The conversation opens with the strategic vs. financial buyer dynamic. In a period of uncertainty, financial sponsors are more resistant to defensive punts because they need to underwrite specific return targets in a highly uncertain environment.  Beyond the motivational split, Graham walks through the structural pressures on PE returns. Cost of leverage has risen with floating-rate debt getting more expensive in a hawkish rate environment.  Purchase price multiples remain elevated (Bain calls it a "deal cost index" at all-time highs). High entry combined with high cost of debt makes it structurally harder to underwrite the returns PE requires. Software exposure is the other major theme. PE has historically been overweight software for good reasons (cash-generative, recurring revenue, pricing power), which now looks vulnerable to what one analyst calls the "SaaS-alypse", the fear that AI will destroy the software space overnight.  Graham is skeptical the collapse will be as sudden or sweeping as the narrative suggests, but the fear alone is enough to spook LPs and put pressure on private credit funds that back PE deals. The result is a broader machine slowdown. Holding periods have extended from the traditional 5 years to 7 years on average, which erodes IRR. LPs aren't getting their capital back at expected pace.  New fundraising is more difficult. Only the highest-quality assets are trading, which means the remaining book is likely lower-quality than the marks suggest, creating further LP hesitation. Continuation vehicles have become one workaround, but Graham flags that they carry their own LP concerns around marking and capital return.  The episode closes on what would need to change: more clarity on the software/AI trajectory, and PE firms doing what they can, running existing assets as well as possible until exit conditions improve. Key Discussion Points: The 9-year backlog: 13,500 portfolio companies and a fundraising collapse to $159.6bn in H1Strategic vs. financial buyers in uncertainty: why sponsors sit tight while corporates moveCost of leverage pressure: floating rates and rising interest bills eroding equity returnsThe Bain "deal cost index" and elevated purchase multiplesSoftware exposure and the "SaaS-alypse" fear: overblown or real?Extended holding periods (5 years to 7 years) and IRR compressionThe best assets sold first: what that means for LP confidence in remaining marksContinuation vehicles: solution or symptom of the broader slowdown?What could restart the PE deal machineWhat's the Big Deal? is an educational podcast covering deals and market developments in public and private markets. Nothing in this episode constitutes financial advice. Financial & Valuation Modeling Certification Program Premium Package (DISCOUNT CODE: WTBD): https://www.wallstreetprep.com/self-study-programs/premium-package/ WTBD Newsletter:  https://webmail.wallstreetprep.com/whats-the-big-deal Socials: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/wall-street-prep/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/wallstreetprep/ Resources: https://linktr.ee/wallstreetprep

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番組について

Get the view from the inside. Every week, Graham Smith (ex-Ares) and Deborah Taylor (ex-Barclays) take a look at Wall Street’s headline-grabbing deals.  From mega-mergers and hostile takeovers to complex private credit transactions, they break down the why, the how, and the who behind the numbers.

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    Wall Street Prep
  • 配信期間
    26年
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    24
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    不適切な内容を含む
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    © 2026 What's The Big Deal?
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