Investment Banking interview preparation
Every question below is either traced to a named firm from a public candidate report, or tagged at desk level when we could not trace it. Answers are written the way you would actually say them out loud — answer first, then the mechanism, then the limitation.
100 questions, mapped to the firms that asked them
- Questions
- 100
- Traced to a firm
- 100
- Firms
- 46
- Updated
- September 2026
006Explain how an increase in accounts payable affects free cash flow.Perella Weinberg PartnersInvestment Banking · Chicago · 2026Perella Weinberg PartnersInvestment Banking · New York · 2026
Say this
It increases free cash flow. An increase in a liability means you have taken the goods but not yet paid, so cash stays in the business. It is a source of cash.
Then walk it
- Accounts payable up means cash held back, so it is a positive working capital adjustment on the cash flow statement.
- The general rule: liabilities up is a source of cash, assets up is a use of cash.
- It does not touch EBITDA or EBIT at all. The expense was already recognised; only the timing of payment changed.
- So unlevered free cash flow rises by exactly the increase in payables, with no tax effect.
- Worth flagging the quality issue: stretching payables to flatter cash flow is a classic window-dressing move, and it reverses the next period.
Where candidates lose it
Getting the direction right but saying nothing about durability. Anyone can memorise the sign. The candidate who adds 'this reverses next quarter and is a red flag if it keeps growing' is the one who sounds like an analyst.
Expect next
- Now do accounts receivable.
- How would you spot a company stretching payables?
- How do you treat a permanent step-up in payables in a DCF?
Reported by candidates at Perella Weinberg Partners (Investment Banking, Chicago, 2026); Perella Weinberg Partners (Investment Banking, New York, 2026). Source: Wall Street Oasis.
047How are current macroeconomic conditions affecting the M&A market?Deutsche BankInvestment Banking · Boston · 2025Perella Weinberg PartnersInvestment Banking · Houston · 2025
Say this
Work the chain from rates to deal volume: the cost and availability of debt sets what sponsors can pay, valuation gaps between buyers and sellers set whether processes clear, and confidence in forecasts sets whether boards will commit at all.
Then walk it
- Rates first. Financing cost sets the sponsor's maximum entry multiple directly, because the deal has to service the debt. Higher rates compress what leverage can support.
- Then the bid-ask spread. Sellers anchor on the multiple they could have got two years ago, buyers price off today's cost of capital. When that gap is wide, processes get pulled and volume falls.
- Then financing availability, which is separate from price. Private credit has taken a large share of leveraged lending from the banks, so deals can now get done even when the syndicated market is shut.
- Then confidence. Boards do not approve transformational deals when they cannot forecast next year. That is why uncertainty hurts volume more than the level of rates does.
- And the composition effect worth naming: in tougher markets you see more all-stock mergers, more minority and structured deals, more corporate carve-outs as companies raise cash, and more take-privates when public multiples fall below private marks.
Where candidates lose it
Answering with stale numbers or none at all. You do not need to be right about the exact policy rate, but you must know roughly where rates sit and one live example of a deal or a sector that reflects it. Update this the week of your interview.
Expect next
- What makes a good IPO environment?
- What would you expect to happen to deal volume next year?
- How has private credit changed leveraged finance?
Reported by candidates at Deutsche Bank (Investment Banking, Boston, 2025); Perella Weinberg Partners (Investment Banking, Houston, 2025). Source: Wall Street Oasis.
084How would you value an insurance brokerage that operates in one country that has just had a coup and writes only one line of coverage?Perella Weinberg PartnersFinancial Institutions Group · New York · 2026
Say this
Start from the normal brokerage framework, which is a commission stream on premium, then attack it with the two facts they gave you: extreme country risk and total product concentration. The answer is a wide range with a real chance of zero.
Then walk it
- The base framework: a broker earns commission on premium and holds no underwriting risk, so it is a capital-light, high-margin, recurring revenue business that normally trades at a premium multiple on EBITDA.
- Now the coup. The currency may be unconvertible, so you may not be able to repatriate cash at all. That alone can make a profitable business worth little to a foreign buyer.
- Country risk enters the discount rate through a sovereign spread, and in a post-coup situation that could be well over 1,000 basis points. It also enters the cash flows, because premium volumes fall when economic activity stops.
- Single line of coverage means no diversification. If that line is motor and vehicle imports halt, or it is trade credit and trade stops, revenue can go to near zero. So I would model scenarios rather than a base case: functioning state, prolonged instability, and asset seizure.
- So: probability-weight the scenarios, discount at a rate that reflects the sovereign, and cross-check against what a local buyer would pay, because a domestic acquirer does not face the repatriation problem and will value it far higher than a foreign one.
- The honest conclusion is that the identity of the buyer determines the value here more than the cash flows do.
Where candidates lose it
Running a standard brokerage multiple and ignoring the two facts in the question. The coup and the single line are the question. And missing the repatriation point, which is the specific insight that makes the foreign buyer's value different from the local buyer's.
Expect next
- Who would actually buy it?
- How would you size the country risk premium?
- What if the currency is pegged but not convertible?
Reported by candidates at Perella Weinberg Partners (Financial Institutions Group, 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.