CFA-->CPA question

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kevinf12

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CPA fits in for M&A advisory and/or transaction service roles (pre deal due diligence)...lot of firms it is a requirement for manager.
 
Hey bhill020,

Would you mind taking this to email? If you feel uncomfortable giving out your email here, you can send me one at: mezierb [at] hotmail . com

Thanks for your time!


bhill020 Wrote:
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> Mez
>
> The CA has been great for me but I think it
> depends in large part where you do your articling.
> I articled with a Big Four and it opened a lot of
> doors. If you article at a small firm, you just
> don't get the same breadth and depth of experience
> or network of contacts. Once you pass the uniform
> final exam (UFE), you can also go on a secondment
> virtually anywhere in the world with the Big Four.
> I went to the Cayman Islands for a year before
> moving out of audit.
>
> When I returned from Cayman and started applying
> for corporate finance / banking (front office)
> jobs, I found the market to be very receptive to
> the CA designation. There were very few jobs that
> I applied for where I did not get an interview. I
> may be wrong but it seems that the CA in Canada is
> a more highly regarded designation then the CPA in
> the U.S. Now, keep in mind that I was applying to
> Canadian firms (e.g. RBC, etc.). I doubt the U.S.
> BB's would be very receptive to the CA
> designation. If you want to do i-banking at a BB
> in the U.S., MBA (from a top school) seems to be
> far and away the best route. However, the banks
> in Canada (some more than others) seem to like the
> strong understanding of FS that the CA provides.
>
>
> You can also work in Corporate Finance (CF) at a
> Big Four to get sell-side experience with a view
> to moving on to a bank. The Big Four in Canada
> all provide mid-market sell-side investment
> banking services, with the exception of
> underwriting. So more sale mandates of private
> businesses, raising PE or debt financing, etc.
> They don't provide much of these services in the
> U.S. due to regulatory concerns. I think KPMG
> Corporate Finance Inc. is the only one providing
> IB in the U.S. Most of the finance related work
> performed by the Big Four in the U.S. is
> "Transaction Services" (i.e. due diligence) which
> is completely different from CF (it's really just
> glorifed auditing).
>
> Let me know if you have any more specific
> questions. I would be happy to answer.
 
I have always wondered why accountants have to study for the CPA? What were those 30 hours of accounting in college for?
 
Hey Miker,

Don't know why all these people feel the need to drag you down. As I've been looking at analyst positions in the DFW area, every last single one of them says CPA or CFA preferred, which means don't bother applying if you don't have one of the two. Being an analyst means being able to dig into financial statements and make adjustments and detect fraud, etc... which is what the CPA is all about. Firms won't say you don't know what you want to be when you grow up, they'll say this kid is ambitious and smart. In no way, shape or form will taking the CPA hurt you, it can only help, so do it. I would start with BEC, as it overlaps nicely with the CFA, and you won't need 400 hours. My buddy said he studied two weekends to pass BEC.
 
aldford Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Hey Miker,
>
> Don't know why all these people feel the need to
> drag you down. As I've been looking at analyst
> positions in the DFW area, every last single one
> of them says CPA or CFA preferred, which means
> don't bother applying if you don't have one of the
> two. Being an analyst means being able to dig
> into financial statements and make adjustments and
> detect fraud, etc... which is what the CPA is all
> about. Firms won't say you don't know what you
> want to be when you grow up, they'll say this kid
> is ambitious and smart. In no way, shape or form
> will taking the CPA hurt you, it can only help, so
> do it. I would start with BEC, as it overlaps
> nicely with the CFA, and you won't need 400 hours.
> My buddy said he studied two weekends to pass
> BEC.


Drag down, no. Being honest, voicing their opinion --- yes. Besides you said it your self. If you have CFA or CPA why bother getting the other. Clearly CFA is more applicable, the choice is obvious then, unless your a stubborn mule. And since when did CPA qualify one to be a good financial statement analyst. Most CPAs I've talked with scoff at the adjustments that we are required to know for CFA. The more analytical portions, especially in terms of comparing firms statement, of FSA is not even covered in the CPA curriculum.
 
Bleeck Wrote:
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> CPA is always a crappy job.


Its a job.

Im willing to bet that working in a salt mine is a crappier job, we should have a better perspective, heh, im going back to bed.
 
"CPA is always a crappy job."

what a ridiculous comment. don't you know you show your ignorance when you stay "always" for stuff like this? yes, the upside of CFA is better than the upside of CPA, but i think i could get by on 7 figures. it doesn't matter what i'm doing, that's not a crappy job.
 
It's ignorant to respond with figures. An accountant by definition is not adding value.

Wouldn't keep me going.

There may be people making 8 figures and still have crappy jobs.
 
A CPA though isnt a job...it is a credential. There are many jobs that have people with the license, so I guess I dont understand the comment?
 
bhill, did you end up in ibanking or PM? I am big 4 Audit as of the fall and want to make the move after that but I have also looked at the cayman island secondements or doing a year in financial advisory after I get the CA before I quit. Cayman jobs look solid but the variety is non-existent did the clients get boring fast?

Mez, same position as you. I did the i-banking interviews but botching multiples in some questions and market tanking led me to the Big 4, which I interned at anyway. I'm not too concerned about it. Canadian CA is 180 degrees, perception wise, from the CPA.
 
Hey ca-cbv-cfa,

Have you heard about them changing the requirements? I believe you can also rotate into the advisory department at any of the big4 while still getting your CA.
 
hey mez.

ya i know my buddies are in fas but i signed in a different dept, hard to transfer before you get ca and at that point i will quit anyways lol.
 
re: Caymans

I would not suggest going to the Caymans if you want to get into corporate finance or M&A. That type of work does not exist in Cayman and therefore the secondment will only slow your career down.

Your options in Cayman are audit of investment funds or fund administration (i.e. back office admin. work). The actual fund management (investment management) is all done onshore in NY or London. The funds are "registered" in Cayman for regulatory purposes and simply outsource their back office accounting to service providers in the Caymans. You end up auditing (or working at) these outsourced service providers. The audits are small, one man jobs and you generally don't interact with fund managers at all because you only deal with the administrators who are offshore.

On the other hand, if you want to take a year or so and just relax on the beach before getting more serious with your career, then the Caymans are perfect. But just keep in mind that the work, in my opinion, is tedious, highly specialized and generally uninteresting.
 
ca-cbv-cfa

I work in the corporate finance & investment banking group of one of the Big Four. The work is 90% sell-side where we advise mid-market clients in sale or capital raise mandates including running the entire process (usually in an auction environment).

So I can tell you first hand that financial advisory (FAS) would definitely be helpful for moving into banking because a lot of the work is the same stuff that you would do at a bank (e.g. preparing pitch books, financing memorandums, financial modeling, negotiating with buyers / investors, etc.) We just do it on a smaller scale (mid-market...the stuff that flys below the big banks radar) and do not do underwriting. So out mandates are usually sales of private businesses or raising private equity financing.

With that said, not all areas of FAS would be very helpful. Corporate Finance (CF) is where you will get the experience noted above. Transaction Services (TS or due diligence) is different and is essentially glorified audit...but obviously would be more applicable to banking than standard audit because you're still working on deals...you're just not getting exposure until the deal is all but completed and you come in to do the final checks and balances. Restructuring, again would be better than audit but it is not great deal experience in my opinion, as it usually involves a lot of bankruptcy / court process paper shuffling, especially at the junior levels.

Another consideration is which of the Big Four you work at and how strong their CF group is in the particular city that you work in. There is great variation in this component, as a couple of the Big Four in each city seem to be much more dominant in the mid-market than the other two. Some of the Big Four CF groups in any given city have 2 or 3 people and complete a couple deals a year. Others have 10 or more professionals and a very strong deal flow. Deal flow can be the difference between spending your year working on live deals and getting real experience or spending your year in PPoint building pitch books because you have no work. You need to do your own due diligence before signing on with any group.

The banks do make attempts to recruit some of us from Big Four CF because they know that they're getting a CA with relevant experience. I would not change to a bank at this point because I have friends at the banks who do similar work but they leave the office at midnight every night and I leave at 7pm (midnight occasionally but very rare). The trade-off of my personal life is just not worth it to me.

I agree with your comment that the CA is perceived very, very different from the CPA. The CA experience req'ts did just recently change. You can obtain your CA in industry but there are very few companies who have been approved to do this. Telus (in BC) is one of them. I am not aware of any others yet. You can also get your experience in other lines of service than audit but most of the firms have not been approved for this yet, as there are various reqts for them to meet. Some of them have been approved for Tax.
 
thanks for the information and response, im in tech/media audit and will hopefully move into fas in the next couple of years.
 
Mez Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Hey ca-cbv-cfa,
>
> Have you heard about them changing the
> requirements? I believe you can also rotate into
> the advisory department at any of the big4 while
> still getting your CA.


thats true, you can actually qualify as a CA working in industry now, they changed the rules in 2007.
 
SeanC Wrote:
> thats true, you can actually qualify as a CA
> working in industry now, they changed the rules in
> 2007.

Very few companies in industry are actually qualified at this stage to take on CA students. The req'ts are stringent. For example, Ontario has just a handful of companies permitted with the only notable ones being Royal Bank, Telus and Manulife. See link below.

http://www.icao.on.ca/Admissions/ApprovedTrainingOffices/1008page1341.aspx

Right now, Wolridge Mahon (a mid-size firm) is the only CA firm in BC permitted to put CA students through in Financial Advisory. Other firms have not yet qualified to do this. PwC is permitted to put students through in Tax but not yet other areas (except of course, Audit).

To find this stuff out you basically just go to each Provincial Institute website and look under its "approved training offices".
 
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