Associate – Fund Opinions

Job Description

Associate, Fund Opinions | Houlihan Lokey

The Tone:
Houlihan Lokey is a leading global investment bank recognized for delivering independent strategic and financial advice across mergers and acquisitions, capital solutions, financial restructuring, and financial and valuation advisory. This full-time Associate role is based in either New York, NY or Chicago, IL. As an Associate in the dedicated Fund Opinions group, you will play a critical role in executing client engagements, analyzing investments, and delivering essential fairness opinions and related valuation advisory services to assist financial sponsors with their transaction approval processes and investor communications.

The TL;DR
• Role: Early Career
• Location: In-person, New York, NY or Chicago, IL
• Pay: $150000–$170000 yearly
• Team: Dedicated Fund Opinions (FO) group, partnering frequently with internal industry coverage and asset class specialist groups, reporting to officers.
• Mission: Execute client engagements by reviewing transactions, analyzing applicable investments, and delivering fairness opinions and related valuation advisory services to assist financial sponsors with their transaction approval process and investor communications, while also contributing to the growth of the Fund Opinions practice.
• Tech Stack: Excel

What You’ll Actually Do
• Financial Analysis: Analyze and explain historical and projected financial information.
• Due Diligence: Perform business and financial due diligence, conducting industry, competitor, and sub-sector research.
• Valuation Projects: Conduct complex valuation projects utilizing methods including comparable company analysis, precedent transactions, and discounted cash flow analysis.
• Financial Modeling: Build complex financial models in Excel to assess cash flows of a company and value specific securities.
• Client Communications: Prepare client and internal board review PowerPoint presentations supporting advice and opinions.

The Must-Haves
• Background: An undergraduate degree in finance, accounting, economics, or a related field, providing a foundational understanding of financial and valuation advisory principles.
• Experience: 3-4 years of experience in investment banking, valuation, or a related financial advisory capacity.
• Skills: Strong accounting, finance, financial modeling, and analytical abilities, complemented by robust qualitative and quantitative research skills, and excellent oral and written communication skills.
• Bonus: Ability to lead projects and client meetings, demonstrated experience supervising analysts on client engagements, intellectual curiosity, a results-driven professional approach, a very strong work ethic, organizational skills, the ability to multi-task in a deadline-driven environment, and proficiency in working independently while also being a collaborative team player.