M&A / PE - What Should I Read? Forum

[deng]

I have a bit of M&A experience, and am transitioning into more PE work. I feel like I'm a good practitioner but always feel like I could do more substantive reading on M&A topics.

What blogs/treatises/books/media do you folks read to stay current and improve your substantive knowledge?

Any PE-focused resources would be appreciated as well.

[CanadianWolf]

Without knowing specifics about your background (work experience & education), the best approach might be to google Amazon books for topics related to your interests.

[s1m4]

Without knowing specifics about your background (work experience & education), the best approach might be to google Amazon books for topics related to your interests.

Are you a real poster?

[Lawsohard99]

Axios pro rata, fortune’s term sheet, and deal book are helpful resources knowing what’s going on in the industry. I usually do pro rata only but used to do the others until Dan Primack moved to Axios and his daily newsletter is terrific.

Teach yourself how to read a balance sheet / basic financials, understand what EBITDA is, what GAAP means (particularly as applied to estimates), it’s invaluable and amazing the level some people get to with little financial literacy.

And then just google everything you hear but don’t understand. A lot of firms have decent blogs that answer most basic concepts that are totally jargonized at this point (like specific performance lite, materiality scrapes, step ups). Depending on the PE it typically won’t look too different from M&A but clients tend to be more sophisticated and, as a result, tend to know more jargon / legal concepts.

[Necho2]

Basically just big business books that will introduce you to general themes, and Matt Levine's Money Stuff newsletter (once he comes back from paternity leave) to stay updated on day to day stuff and terminology.

Barbarians at the Gates, Bad Blood, Mike Isaac's book on Uber. Just deep background stuff that gives you a sense of what the folks you'll be working with think is interesting about business transactions.

The Epicurean Dealmaker's blogging back catalog was really helpful to me when I need to learn about the financial services from scratch, so was Equity Private's, but not sure if it's still available.

[SamuelDanforth]

I am so glad that The Epicurean Dealmaker was left online for future generations. It is great.

[blair.waldorf]

Barbarians at the Gate.

[sms18]

For books, also highly recommend King of Capital and Bloodsport, in addition to Barbarians at the Gate.

[Voxius]

If you’re looking for something substantive, Structuring Venture Capital, Private Equity and Entrepreneurial Transactions by Jack Levin (K&E partner) is great. It walks through in reasonable terms a lot of the considerations in PE deals.

[CanadianWolf]

Yes, I am a real poster. LOL

Listen to Voxius. Do not waste your time on non-substantive material.

I would recommend books that have been incredibly helpful resources, but they are too specialized.

[chingwoo]

Merger Market / LCD comps are very solid for staying up to date on what's going on if you have access though may be a bit too commercial.

[Anonymous User]

Does anyone have recommendations for M&E/PE podcasts?

Law student, here, who learns a lot from conversational/interview podcasts (not overly produced like Serial).

So far, I've found Bloomberg's The Tape podcast to be good for substantive business news. But am hoping for good interviews with PE/M&A lawyers, etc.

[qxfr]

Matt Levine's Money Stuff is really good.

Barbarians at the Gate is good to get you excited about the work and it's what everyone pretends M&A/PE is like, but of course it rarely is.

Working through something like this (don't worry, you can do it even if you don't have a finance background) will be very helpful: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/11186 ... UTF8&psc=1

[CanadianWolf]

Once again, I suggest that you follow the suggestion of Voxius posted above if you want substantive material for legal work.

At least one other solid recommendation by qxfr may be more appropriate for finance folks & accountants as I doubt that you do any modeling as an attorney.

Additionally, look over the PLI offerings.

[qxfr]

On a day to day basis, you don't need to know much about finance/accounting or know how to model. But, speaking as a senior associate (in finance, not M&A), not really understanding financial statements is one of the biggest weaknesses that junior and mid-level associates have.

[CanadianWolf]

That is why in my initial post I hesitated at recommending books for the original poster as no educational background was shared and only minimal practice experience was given.

[legalpotato]

Bumping this for any recommendations on online resources for drafting. Obviously PracticalLaw gives drafting advise, but anyone have recommendations for general corporate/M&A education and drafting guidance?