By Tara Lachapelle, Brooke Sutherland & Miles Weiss Blackstone Group LP (BX) and Carl Icahn’s bids for Dell Inc. (DELL) are employing a rarely used deal tactic that has yielded both big payouts and big losses for shareholders. The offers allowing investors to retain stock in the floundering personal-computer maker may help them win over shareholders like Southeastern Asset Management Inc., who want […]

“Large deals are flashy and they get people’s attention,” said Scott Rostan, who once analyzed mergers at Merrill Lynch & Co. and now runs New York-based Training The Street, giving instruction on takeovers to new hires at banks. “But the large, transformational deals are really hard to pull off. Typically you have to pay a big price to convince the seller. Synergies are very hard to realize. There may be cultural differences. Put that all together and you’ve got a recipe for disaster.”

Cleaning Up Balance Sheets, One Repo at a Time  A new accounting proposal could clear up CFOs’ uncertainty about where to book repurchase agreements. By Kathleen Hoffelder A new proposal by the Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) should eliminate the accounting allowances that made it easy for Lehman Brothers and MF Global to mislabel short-term […]

“This is Malone and management’s way of saying Starz has a lot of value on its own,” said Training The Street’s Rostan, a former M&A analyst whose New York-based firm trains new hires at banks on mergers.

    http://video.foxbusiness.com/v/2013703363001/citigroup-plans-to-cut-11000-jobs/?playlist_id=933116624001

Sprint Nextel assumes majority stake in Clearwire By Ben Berkowitz and Nicola Leske (Reuters) – Wireless carrier Sprint Nextel Corp (S.N) said it has acquired a majority interest in Clearwire Corp (CLWR.O) by buying a stake from the company’s founder. A similar attempt by Sprint to take control of Clearwire last week was scuttled by […]

7 Hours vs. 7 Seconds: Job Preparedness for MBA Students It’s an all too familiar story. It’s 1995, and I’m at Merrill Lynch.  I find myself in the downtown office at 2:00 a.m. on a Thursday night staring at an Excel spreadsheet that doesn’t balance.  I keep trying to solve the problem, calculating and recalculating.  […]

Guest Post: Tips for the Investment Banking Interview and Hiring Process Wanda E Drummond  provides these tips for nailing an investment banking interview and navigating the hiring process in the uber-competitive market. Social Media Lock-Down: Invest time in setting up your Facebook security. Create different groups that will only have a limited view – no […]

By Julie Steinberg M.B.A. students are still anxious to join the finance industry and more willing to consider jobs at boutique advisory firms and middle market investment banks, according to a new survey. When asked what type of firm would be their top employment choice, 27% of students said large financial institutions, down from 34% […]

Survey: MBA Hiring Remains Strong Despite Downtick in Student Optimism  — Bulge Bracket Banks Still Top Choice For MBA’s — NEW YORK, JUNE 26, 2012/PRNewswire – The vast majority of MBA graduates are still receiving competitive job offers, despite their increasing concerns about employment prospects. That’s one of the key findings of a new survey […]