Investment Banking interview preparation

Questions

100

Traced to a firm

100

Firms

46

Updated

September 2026

Asked at

All firmsTSTruist Securities10Rothschild & Co8Centerview Partners7CSCredit Suisse7HWHarris Williams6Houlihan Lokey6Lazard6Mizuho6Barclays5Citi5Deutsche Bank5Evercore5Moelis & Company5MSMorgan Stanley5Piper Sandler5RCRBC Capital Markets5Goldman Sachs4Nomura4TD Securities4Bank of America3GSGuggenheim Securities3J.P. Morgan3Jefferies3Moody's3Perella Weinberg Partners3WPWarburg Pincus3WBWilliam Blair3HSBC2Lincoln International2Scotiabank2TPTPG2UBS2Wells Fargo Securities2Advent International1Apollo Global Management1Bain Capital1Balyasny Asset Management1BLBlackRock1BPBNP Paribas1General Atlantic1Invesco1Morningstar1PIMCO1STSociété Générale1SSState Street1WMWellington Management1

Topic

All topicsAccounting14Valuation21M&A10Markets and deals10Capital markets3LBO8Leveraged finance3Restructuring2Credit3Debt capital markets2Capital structure2Case and estimation11Brainteasers6Fit5

Level

AnyCoreIntermediateHard

Type

AnyTechnicalCaseBrainteaserFitMarket view

1. 063Given this capital structure, what is the recovery on each claim?RestructuringHardsuperdayHoulihan LokeyRestructuring · New York · 2026

   Say this

   Value the enterprise first, then pay it out down the waterfall in strict seniority until it runs out. Whichever tranche the value runs out in is the fulcrum security, and that is where the equity ends up after the restructuring.

   Then walk it

   1. Establish enterprise value. In distress I would use a distressed multiple on normalised EBITDA and cross-check against a liquidation value, because the two set a range.
   2. Then the waterfall: super-priority and DIP financing first, then secured claims in order of lien priority, then unsecured bonds, then subordinated debt, then preferred, then common.
   3. Work down until the value is exhausted. Say enterprise value is $600, the revolver and term loan total $400 and recover in full, and the unsecured bonds are $400. They receive the remaining $200, so a 50 percent recovery.
   4. Those bonds are the fulcrum. They are the class that gets converted into the new equity, which is why distressed funds buy the fulcrum, not the safest paper.
   5. Everything below the fulcrum, subordinated debt and common equity, recovers nothing in a strict waterfall. In practice they often receive a small stub or warrants to buy consent and avoid a contested plan, which is a negotiation outcome rather than an entitlement.

   Where candidates lose it

   Jumping to the waterfall before establishing enterprise value. You cannot allocate what you have not measured. And missing the fulcrum concept entirely, which is the single most important idea in the discipline.

   Expect next

   • Which security would you buy?
   • What is the absolute priority rule and when is it violated?
   • What section of the indenture deals with payment waterfalls?

   Reported by candidates at Houlihan Lokey (Restructuring, New York, 2026). Source: Wall Street Oasis.

2. 085Given a B2B SaaS company with this EBITDA and this P/E, what would you do to improve its operations and financials?Case and estimationHardsuperdayHoulihan LokeyInvestment Banking · New York · 2026

   Say this

   Work the SaaS levers in order of value: pricing, then retention, then sales efficiency, then cost. In software, a point of net revenue retention is worth more than a point of cost saving, because it compounds.

   Then walk it

   1. Pricing first. Most B2B software is underpriced relative to the value it delivers. Move to value-based or usage-based pricing, introduce tiers, and raise prices on renewal for the existing base. This is near-pure margin.
   2. Retention second. Net revenue retention above 110 percent means the installed base grows without new sales. Reduce churn in the weakest cohort and upsell modules into the strongest. This changes the growth rate and therefore the multiple.
   3. Sales efficiency third. Look at customer acquisition cost payback and the magic number. If payback is over 24 months, the problem is targeting or pricing, not effort. Reallocate spend to the segments with the fastest payback.
   4. Cost fourth, and deliberately last. Consolidate the cloud bill, rationalise the product portfolio, offshore support engineering. Real money, but it does not change the growth story.
   5. Then the bolt-on question: in a fragmented software vertical, acquiring adjacent modules at a lower multiple and cross-selling them into your base is usually the single largest value-creation lever available.
   6. One flag on the question itself: P/E is an odd metric for a software company, since GAAP earnings are suppressed by growth spend and stock compensation. I would work off EV/ARR and EV/EBITDA instead, and I would say so.

   Where candidates lose it

   Jumping to cost cutting. In software, growth and retention drive the multiple, and the multiple drives the value far more than a margin point does. Also worth noticing that P/E is the wrong lens here; naming that is a real signal.

   Expect next

   • What is the formula for net revenue retention, gross retention and churn?
   • Which of those levers moves the multiple?
   • How would you verify the pipeline to forecast revenue?

   Reported by candidates at Houlihan Lokey (Investment Banking, New York, 2026). Source: Wall Street Oasis.

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.