Equity Research interview preparation

Questions

100

Traced to a firm

72

Firms

45

Updated

September 2026

Asked at

All firmsMorningstar12Man Group6Balyasny Asset Management5BLBlackRock5FTFranklin Templeton5MSCI5Jefferies4CSCredit Suisse3Fidelity Investments3Moody's3Perella Weinberg Partners3Point723S&P Global3The Vanguard Group3WMWellington Management3Advent International2Apollo Global Management2Bank of America2Carlyle Group2DED.E. Shaw2Houlihan Lokey2HSBC2Piper Sandler2Sequoia Capital2SSState Street2Viking Global Investors2WBWilliam Blair2ACAQR Capital Management1BGBaupost Group1BMBNY Mellon1Centerview Partners1Coatue Management1Goldman Sachs1GSGuggenheim Securities1HWHarris Williams1Insight Partners1Invesco1Mizuho1Moelis & Company1MSMorgan Stanley1PIMCO1SCSchroders1Scotiabank1T. Rowe Price1TSTruist Securities1

Topic

All topicsResearch process9Stock pitch6Company analysis8Investment philosophy5Valuation14Modelling2Portfolio and risk8Macro8Sector knowledge2Accounting8Career and fit12Industry knowledge6Quantitative research1Sector: technology3Sector: consumer1Sector: healthcare1Sector: energy1Sector: financials2Sector: industrials1Case and estimation2

Level

AnyCoreIntermediateHard

Type

AnyTechnicalCaseFitBrainteaserMarket view

1. 001How would you analyse a stock?Research processCorephone / first roundJefferiesEquity Research · New York · 2026

   Say this

   Business first, then numbers, then price. Understand how the company makes money and whether that is durable, build a model of what it earns, then decide whether the current price already reflects it.

   Then walk it

   1. Start with the business: what it sells, to whom, what share of revenue comes from where, and who it competes with. You cannot forecast what you cannot describe.
   2. Then the economics: unit economics, gross margin, operating leverage, return on invested capital, and where the cash actually goes.
   3. Then the durability question: what stops a competitor doing this? Switching costs, scale, network effects, regulation, brand. That determines whether today's margin survives.
   4. Then the model: forecast revenue by driver rather than by growth rate, build margin off the cost structure, and get to earnings and free cash flow.
   5. Then valuation and, critically, expectations. The key move in research is not 'what is it worth' but 'what is priced in'. I would reverse-engineer the current price into implied growth and margin, then ask whether I believe those numbers.
   6. The output is a rating, a target, and a variant view. Without a variant view there is no reason for anyone to read the note.

   Where candidates lose it

   Describing a valuation process rather than a research process. Anyone can build a DCF. The job is forming a differentiated view against consensus, so the expectations step has to appear in your answer.

   Expect next

   • What moves a stock?
   • What is your variant view on that name?
   • How do you know what is priced in?

   Reported by candidates at Jefferies (Equity Research, New York, 2026). Source: Wall Street Oasis.

2. 026What makes up a fund's net asset value?Industry knowledgeCoretechnicalMan GroupEquity Hedge · Boston · 2019

   Say this

   The market value of everything the fund owns, less everything it owes, divided by units outstanding. Assets are the positions plus cash and receivables; liabilities are shorts, borrowings, accrued fees and payables.

   Then walk it

   1. Assets: the mark-to-market value of long positions, cash, margin held at the prime broker, dividends and interest receivable, and unrealised gains on derivatives.
   2. Liabilities: short positions valued at market, leverage and margin borrowings, accrued management and performance fees, redemptions payable, and unrealised losses on derivatives.
   3. Divide the net figure by units outstanding to get NAV per unit. That per-unit figure is what investors subscribe and redeem at.
   4. The judgement sits in valuation. Liquid listed equities are straightforward. Illiquid or level three assets are marked to model, and that is where NAV becomes an estimate rather than a fact.
   5. Which is why the practical questions matter: who strikes the NAV, how often, and is there an independent administrator? A manager marking its own illiquid book is a governance concern, and saying so shows you understand why the question is asked.

   Where candidates lose it

   Giving the formula and stopping. The interesting content is valuation of illiquid positions and the role of the independent administrator. That is what an operations-aware investor actually cares about.

   Expect next

   • How do you value a level three asset?
   • Who strikes the NAV?
   • What is a side pocket?

   Reported by candidates at Man Group (Equity Hedge, Boston, 2019). Source: Wall Street Oasis.

3. 054What is the difference between EV/EBITDA and P/E, and when do you use each?ValuationCorephone / first roundWBWilliam BlairInvestment Banking · Chicago · 2026

   Say this

   EV/EBITDA values the whole enterprise before capital structure and depreciation policy, so it is for comparing operating businesses. P/E values the equity after everything, so it reflects leverage, tax and accounting choices.

   Then walk it

   1. Use EV/EBITDA when companies differ in leverage, tax position or depreciation policy, and in any M&A context, because a buyer takes the enterprise and refinances it.
   2. Use P/E when comparing similar companies in the same jurisdiction with similar capital structures, and when talking to equity investors who think in earnings per share.
   3. P/E's weaknesses: it is distorted by leverage, by one-offs, by tax rate changes and by share buybacks, and it is meaningless with negative earnings.
   4. EV/EBITDA's weakness: it ignores capital intensity entirely, so two companies with identical EBITDA but very different CapEx look identical when they are not.
   5. For financials you use neither in the usual form. Price to tangible book against ROTE, because enterprise value has no meaning for a bank.
   6. In practice a research note shows both plus a cash-flow-based measure like free cash flow yield, and the interesting analysis is usually where the two multiples disagree, because that gap is telling you something about leverage or capital intensity.

   Where candidates lose it

   Reciting definitions without saying when each breaks. And forgetting that for banks and insurers both are inappropriate, which is the follow-up that catches people.

   Expect next

   • Why can you not use EV/EBITDA for a bank?
   • What if the two multiples disagree?
   • What does free cash flow yield add?

   Reported by candidates at William Blair (Investment Banking, Chicago, 2026). Source: Wall Street Oasis.

4. 068What is the difference between alpha and beta, and why does it matter to an employer?Portfolio and riskCoretechnicalHWHarris WilliamsInvestment Banking · Los Angeles · 2025BLBlackRockRisk and Quantitative Analysis · New York · 2026

   Say this

   Beta is the return you get from market exposure, which anyone can buy cheaply. Alpha is the return above what that exposure explains. It matters because clients will not pay active fees for something an index fund delivers.

   Then walk it

   1. Formally, regress portfolio returns on market returns. The slope is beta, the intercept is alpha.
   2. Beta is commoditised. An index fund delivers it for a few basis points, so a manager charging 1 percent for closet-index beta is destroying value for the client.
   3. Alpha is the residual and it is scarce. The difficulty is that much apparent alpha turns out to be exposure to a factor that was not in the simple model, which is why multi-factor attribution matters.
   4. The industry consequence is the shift to passive and the barbell: cheap beta at one end, genuinely differentiated high-conviction or alternative strategies at the other, with the middle being squeezed out.
   5. For a multi-manager platform the framing goes further: the platform wants pure idiosyncratic alpha and hedges out the factor exposure centrally, which is exactly why analysts there are asked about hedging and factor neutrality.
   6. So the practical answer to 'why does it matter' is that your job is to produce the part that cannot be bought for four basis points.

   Where candidates lose it

   Defining the terms without the commercial implication. The reason this gets asked is the fee model of the entire industry, and connecting it to why active management is under pressure is what makes the answer land.

   Expect next

   • How much apparent alpha is really factor exposure?
   • Why has money moved to passive?
   • How does a multi-manager platform think about this?

   Reported by candidates at Harris Williams (Investment Banking, Los Angeles, 2025); BlackRock (Risk and Quantitative Analysis, New York, 2026). Source: Wall Street Oasis.

5. 069What is the difference between a mutual fund and an ETF?Industry knowledgeCoretechnicalPIMCOCompliance · Los Angeles · 2024The Vanguard GroupGeneralist · Malvern · 2026

   Say this

   Both are pooled vehicles. A mutual fund transacts once a day at NAV directly with the fund; an ETF trades on an exchange all day at a market price, with authorised participants creating and redeeming units in kind.

   Then walk it

   1. Trading: mutual fund orders all execute at the day's closing NAV. ETFs trade continuously, so you can buy intraday, use limit orders, and in some markets short them or trade options on them.
   2. The creation and redemption mechanism is the structural difference. Authorised participants exchange a basket of securities for ETF units, which keeps the market price close to NAV through arbitrage.
   3. Tax, in the US specifically: in-kind redemption lets an ETF hand out low-basis securities without realising gains, so ETFs generally distribute far fewer capital gains than mutual funds. This is a major driver of their growth.
   4. Costs: ETFs typically have lower expense ratios but you pay a bid-ask spread and possibly a brokerage commission, so for small regular investments a mutual fund can work out cheaper.
   5. Access and minimums: mutual funds often have minimum investments and support automatic contribution plans; ETFs need a brokerage account and trade in whole units unless fractional trading is offered.
   6. In India the same distinction holds, with the added practical point that ETF liquidity varies a lot outside the largest index products, so tracking difference and spreads matter more than the headline expense ratio.

   Where candidates lose it

   Saying only 'ETFs trade on an exchange'. The substantive differences are the creation-redemption mechanism and the tax consequence that follows from it. Both should be in the answer.

   Expect next

   • Why are ETFs more tax efficient?
   • When would you recommend a mutual fund instead?
   • What causes an ETF to trade away from NAV?

   Reported by candidates at PIMCO (Compliance, Los Angeles, 2024); The Vanguard Group (Generalist, Malvern, 2026). Source: Wall Street Oasis.

6. 079Walk me through the three statements and tell me which one you would want if you could only have one.AccountingCorephone / first roundMoody'sGeneralist · New York · 2022JefferiesEquity Research · New York · 2026

   Say this

   The cash flow statement. It is the hardest to manipulate, it tells you whether the reported profit is real, and it shows you the capital allocation decisions, which reveal what management actually believes.

   Then walk it

   1. The linkage first: net income flows from the income statement to the top of the cash flow statement and into retained earnings; ending cash flows onto the balance sheet.
   2. Why cash flow: it reconciles accounting judgement back to something verifiable. Starting from net income and adjusting to cash, it exposes the accruals in between.
   3. It also contains the investing and financing sections, so you see CapEx, acquisitions, buybacks, dividends and debt movements. That is the capital allocation record in one page.
   4. The honest caveat: the cash flow statement alone does not tell you whether the business is profitable, what the margin structure is, or how leveraged the balance sheet is. You would be flying with one instrument.
   5. And it can be managed at the margin: classifying items between operating and investing, timing payments around the period end, and factoring receivables all flatter operating cash flow.
   6. But among the three, it is the one where the gap between reality and presentation is smallest, which is why it is the right answer.

   Where candidates lose it

   Picking the income statement because it shows profit. The expected answer is cash flow, and more importantly the reason: accounting profit involves judgement and cash largely does not. Give the caveat too, since the question is testing judgement, not recall.

   Expect next

   • What can still be manipulated in the cash flow statement?
   • What would you miss without the balance sheet?
   • How do you assess earnings quality from it?

   Reported by candidates at Moody's (Generalist, New York, 2022); Jefferies (Equity Research, New York, 2026). Source: Wall Street Oasis.

7. 091What is the difference between top-down and bottom-up investing?Investment philosophyCorephone / first roundAsset management

   Say this

   Top-down starts from the macro and works to sectors and then stocks. Bottom-up starts from individual companies and builds a portfolio from the best ideas, largely ignoring the macro view.

   Then walk it

   1. Top-down: form a view on growth, rates, inflation and currencies, then decide which regions and sectors benefit, then choose vehicles within them. Common in multi-asset and macro strategies.
   2. Bottom-up: analyse companies on their own merits, buy the ones with the widest gap between price and value, and let the sector weights fall out of that process. Common in fundamental long-only and long-short equity.
   3. The argument for bottom-up is that macro forecasting has a poor track record while company-level analysis has a more reliable edge. The argument for top-down is that in some sectors, banks, energy, mining, the macro variable determines the outcome regardless of company quality.
   4. In practice most fundamental investors are bottom-up with macro awareness: they will not build a macro forecast, but they will know what macro assumption is embedded in their position.
   5. The honest version for an interview is to say which you are and why, and then acknowledge where your approach is weakest. A pure bottom-up investor in a commodity producer is implicitly taking a price view whether they admit it or not.
   6. And match your answer to the firm. Saying you are a pure top-down thinker at a stock-picking shop is a mismatch you can avoid by reading what they run.

   Where candidates lose it

   Claiming to do both equally. That reads as having no process. Pick one, defend it, and acknowledge the cases where the other dominates.

   Expect next

   • Which are you?
   • Where does your approach break down?
   • How much macro should a stock picker have a view on?

Firm tags come from public, anonymous candidate reports on Wall Street Oasis: strong signal, not sworn testimony. Firms are named as the places a question was reported, not as partners of Fin Maverick. Answers are written for this page to show how to think out loud; they are not scripts to recite.