Hey - I have a new analyst starting, and was hoping to get some opinions on which is a better way to learn financial modeling - Benninga or Wall St. Prep? Does the Benninga text come with practice models to complete? Are they any good? The focus would be on building pro forma statements, valuations, etc., if that makes a difference. Thanks!
Benninga focuses on financial modeling in general (you’ll find everything from financial stmt. modeling to binomial option pricing models) while WSP deals almost exclusively with financial statement modeling and valuation. The Benninga books is more like a textbook for sure and it includes a cd with various models and exercises but I found his writing straightforward and intuitive. I would say go with the Benninga book especially given its price (you can snatch it on Amazon for like $65) whereas WSP runs for like $500 for the premium package. Hope this helps.
I have WSP and I’m not too fond of it. VERY elementary.
HHMM I checked out Benninga today and it doesn’t really have that much on financial statement modeling / FCF valuation, it’s pretty basic…
Have both; Benninga feels like it’s a text book. Details of each calculation is described succinctly but it’s up to you to piece the materials together. WSP is very basic in that regard (think about it as intro to investment banking training class) however they do tie all those concept together so that you can see the big picture. If you really want to learn about modeling and yet doesn’t feel compeled to read the thick book of Benninga, I suggest you enroll in wall st analyst training program. It’s more expensive than WSP but the materials are much better.
Used Benninga as a text book during my MBA, Financial Modeling class. I thought it was pretty good, but I also had a very knowledgeable teacher to go along with it. He helped fill in gaps and expand the uses
If you decide to go for WSP, here is my referral code: REF23461. Both of us will get 15% refund. see: http://www.wallstreetprep.com/programs/referral.php
@B_C- I have been looking at the basic self study package. I am pretty green when it comes to excel, and I am looking to get in as a credit analyst at a bank. Would you recommend this package to learn excel for that type of a position? Anything you can tell me would be great, and if i end up deciding to get that sometime soon i will use your referral code. Dont know when i would get it though. Thanks
Hey, I also heard that Training the street is also pretty good…haven’t used…maybe someone who has can give us more insight…a company I applied to, required it over WSP, not sure why…but it is cheaper.
whats the website for that? is it a book like wsp? nevermind…found it
website: http://www.wallstreetprep.com/ I bought the premium package a month ago. It contains 4-5 hardcopy notes + 1 CD. It covers chapter on Financial statement modeling, DCF modeling, Transaction Comparables and LBO. I havn’t time to look into details of each chapter yet. I just have time to look at the DCF modeling part and a bit on financial statement modeling. I found it quite useful for someone new to excel, because it teach us how to create sensitivity analysis, scenario analysis and provide a lot skills on excel. The only thing I am not happy is that it doesn’t teach us how the forecast is done. It just ask to use the figure from analyst reports/annual reports and not teaching us how to create the forecast when forecasts are not available from analyst reports/annual reports.
don’t know why when I type the website, it does not always display well. Let me type again… wallstreetprep.com
B_C Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > don’t know why when I type the website, it does > not always display well. Let me type again… > > wallstreetprep.com How dare you try and type that when ch.ad is promoting Fetch.XL
I definitely agree that Benninga is great, but not for financial models. WSP is good, but as B_C mentioned, it doesn’t really teach one how to forecast.