What's The Big Deal?

Get the view from the inside. Every week, Graham Smith (ex-Ares) and Deborah Taylor (ex-Barclays) take a look at Wall Street’s headline-grabbing deals. From mega-mergers and hostile takeovers to complex private credit transactions, they break down the why, the how, and the who behind the numbers.

What's The Big Deal? is a business podcast hosted by Wall Street Prep, with 22 episodes on record and a Required Pod Score of 80. PitchCentric scores this show on Booking Probability, Listen Score, and live audience signals refreshed every 24 hours.

Wall Street Prep hosts What's The Big Deal?, a business show with 22 episodes published.

Our AI reads these to draft pitches. Use them as grounding for a pitch that cites a real guest and a specific topic.

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  Episode #25

  How to Build INSANE Stock Research Dashboards with Claude

  Aug 13, 202627 minS1

  Graham and Deborah build a full stock research dashboard from scratch using Claude, then use it to take apart a company's latest quarterly results in real time. The data comes straight from SEC EDGAR, the build runs off a single prompt and some back-and-forth, and the output is the kind of analysis that used to need an expensive terminal and a team behind it. The test case is SpaceX's first quarter as a public company, a business with enough contradictions to push an AI-built dashboard to its limits. Revenue beat expectations and the stock fell anyway, so Graham aims the dashboard at the why: cash burn against revenue, how little of the CapEx bill operations actually cover, and whether the $100bn revenue figure management keeps citing survives contact with what the quarter implies. Deborah works the analyst's angle. Where the numbers need manual checking before you trust them, where a run-rate multiple needs context, and the quality-of-earnings question under a headline adjusted EBITDA number leaning on stock-based comp add-backs. They also cover what a dashboard like this leaves out for a genuine investment decision, from share-price context to the market data a portfolio manager would want next to the fundamentals. The broader theme is access: the tooling that used to be the moat is getting cheap fast, and both hosts weigh what that means for anyone running their own research, retail investors included. Neither would trade on the output yet, but neither dismisses where it's heading. Key Discussion Points: Building a live earnings dashboard with Claude Code and free SEC EDGAR data. How fast the cash is going: free cash flow against revenue and a $100bn balance. Why operations covered only 12% of CapEx and where the rest came from. The $100bn revenue claim against the $31.3bn the quarter implies. CapEx at 6.4x depreciation as a growth-stage signal. The stock-based comp add-back debate and the widening adjusted-EBITDA wedge. What the dashboard is missing for a real investment call. The democratization of financial data and what it means for retail investors. Why Wall Street Prep? Wall Street Prep is the trusted training provider for the world's top investment banks, private equity firms, Fortune 1000 companies and business schools. Our online training and instructor-led boot camps are direct adaptations of our corporate training, making Wall Street Prep the ideal choice for those looking to break into finance. DISCLAIMER: The information provided in this video is for educational and entertainment purposes only and does not constitute financial, investment, tax, or legal advice. Investing involves risk, and you may lose some or all of your capital. Past performance is not indicative of future results. Please conduct your own due diligence or consult with a certified professional before making any financial decisions. Investment Banking AI Bootcamp (DISCOUNT CODE: WTBD): https://www.wallstreetprep.com/investment-banking-ai-boot-camp/ WTBD Newsletter: https://webmail.wallstreetprep.com/whats-the-big-deal Socials: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/wall-street-prep/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/wallstreetprep/ Resources: https://linktr.ee/wallstreetprep

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  Episode #24

  Can Claude Build an Investment-Banking Grade 3-Statement Model in Excel?

  Aug 6, 202645 minS1

  Graham asked Fable 5 for a five-year three-statement operating model on Lululemon. A few short paragraphs of instruction: where to pull historic results from, where to source forecasts, what structure to use, which levers matter for a retailer with stores, inventory and an active restructuring plan. What came back was more than a set of forecasts. Claude split revenue by geography rather than product segment, having worked out that the Americas, China and rest of world story matters more for this business than menswear versus womenswear. It chose INDEX over CHOOSE for scenario selection without being asked. It flagged share buybacks so the diluted share count wouldn't distort EPS. It broke out operating leases separately, which matters when a retailer can grow its store base through leases instead of CapEx. It also wasn't flawless. Debs caught a scenario gap in the depreciation logic and a judgment call on deferred revenue that a research analyst would handle with a dedicated schedule. Topics covered: → Why revenue got split by geography instead of product segment → INDEX vs CHOOSE and why unprompted formula choices matter → The readme tab: giving an agent persistent context so the file becomes a living document → Three genuine scenario cases rather than plus or minus 100 basis points → Where the D&A logic breaks when you flex the CapEx case → The deferred revenue treatment Debs would have built differently → Why the Excel API can't create a data table and what Claude did instead → Both grades and why Graham thinks Debs was harsh Why Wall Street Prep? Wall Street Prep is the trusted training provider for the world's top investment banks, private equity firms, Fortune 1000 companies and business schools. Our online training and instructor-led boot camps are direct adaptations of our corporate training, making Wall Street Prep the ideal choice for those looking to break into finance. DISCLAIMER: The information provided in this video is for educational and entertainment purposes only and does not constitute financial, investment, tax, or legal advice. Investing involves risk, and you may lose some or all of your capital. Past performance is not indicative of future results. Please conduct your own due diligence or consult with a certified professional before making any financial decisions. WTBD Newsletter: https://webmail.wallstreetprep.com/whats-the-big-deal Follow Us On Socials: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/wall-street-prep/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/wallstreetprep/ Resources: https://linktr.ee/wallstreetprep

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  Episode #23

  Claude for Investment Banking: Building a One-Pager in PowerPoint with AI

  Jul 30, 202619 minS1

  Graham has a confession: he hates PowerPoint. Always has. The late nights at Lehman Brothers lining up charts pixel by pixel. The IC memos that never end. And when he recently tried using Claude Opus to build slides, his words were blunt: "they looked like cr*p." So this week, he and Debs gave Anthropic's newest model, Fable 5, one sentence and a template. Build an investment banking style company overview for Nvidia. No test runs. No preparation. The result was a genuine split decision. Formatting earned an A from both Debs and Graham: clean, well-aligned, properly labeled with units and sources. The basics that junior analysts routinely forget were all handled correctly. Content was a different story. Graham gave it a B-plus. Debs was harsher: a C. The overview covered Nvidia at a high level but lacked segmental revenue breakdown, forward estimates, and what Graham described as "emotion." The conversation that followed was arguably more interesting than the output itself. Graham argued that PowerPoint might actually outlast Excel as a day-to-day skill in finance: even after you stop building models, you never stop editing IC memos and pitch materials. Debs made the case for reusable prompt "skills," pre-prepared instructions that teams can share and iterate on, as the practical path to getting first-pass results from AI that are actually usable. Debs's closing verdict: "I think this is a superb use of AI in investment banking workflow." Not because the output was perfect, but because the tedious formatting work is exactly what AI should be handling. Key Discussion Points: Graham's confession: why he hates PowerPoint and what Opus produced when he tried it. The Fable 5 test: one prompt, one template, no preparation. The split verdict: formatting A, content B-plus/C. Why the output "lacks emotion" and what that means for AI-generated materials. PowerPoint as a career-long skill: Graham's argument that it outlasts Excel. The skills approach: how banks are building reusable prompt libraries. Why Wall Street Prep? Wall Street Prep is the trusted training provider for the world's top investment banks, private equity firms, Fortune 1000 companies and business schools. Our online training and instructor-led boot camps are direct adaptations of our corporate training, making Wall Street Prep the ideal choice for those looking to break into finance. DISCLAIMER: The information provided in this video is for educational and entertainment purposes only and does not constitute financial, investment, tax, or legal advice. Investing involves risk, and you may lose some or all of your capital. Past performance is not indicative of future results. Please conduct your own due diligence or consult with a certified professional before making any financial decisions. WTBD Newsletter: https://webmail.wallstreetprep.com/whats-the-big-deal Follow Us On Socials: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/wall-street-prep/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/wallstreetprep/ Resources: https://linktr.ee/wallstreetprep

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  Episode #21

  Investment Banking: Claude Fable 5 Just One-Shotted a Bulge Bracket-Grade DCF

  Jul 16, 202647 minS1

  Six weeks ago, Debs and Graham asked Claude Opus to build a DCF. The result got a B-minus from Graham and a C from Debs. Missed calculations, questionable assumptions, no clear reasoning on why it was cutting corners. This week they ran the exact same test — same prompt, same company, no additional guidance — on Anthropic's newest model, Fable 5. The result was a step-change neither Graham or Debs expected. In this episode, Debs and Graham walk through the Fable 5 output in detail. Mid-year discounting handled correctly from the start ("it actually knows how investment bankers think"). Terminal value presented in two methods, perpetuity growth and EBITDA multiple, side by side. Weighted average cost of capital coming in at 10.6%, in line with typical investment banking assumptions. Diluted share count calculated correctly with buybacks accounted for. The model even self-corrected mid-build when it detected a formula error. The Lululemon test produced a striking finding: the DCF implied 45% upside to the current share price, suggesting the market may have Lululemon materially wrong. Six weeks ago, Claude Opus solved for a value in line with the current share price. This time, Fable 5 took a genuine view — it saw upside and said so. They also cover the broader context: CVC's Wall Street Journal-covered use of an AI agent in the Sproutz sale process, what that means for banker fees, and Graham's real-world observation that AI has moved from being a calculator to genuinely forming views on valuations. The verdict: A-minus from Graham, B-plus from Debs. Graham's honest closing question: at $50 in credits per model, is DIY still faster? Fable 5's fate as Anthropic transitions it to usage-only pricing is genuinely uncertain, but the six-week leap the episode captures is not. Key Discussion Points: The six-week transformation: from B-minus/C on Claude Opus to A-minus/B-plus on Fable 5. What Fable 5 is: Anthropic's newest release, its release history, and its credit-limited launch. Mid-year discounting, terminal value approaches, and WACC calculations Fable 5 handled correctly. The self-correction moment: AI detecting and fixing its own mid-build error. The Lululemon finding: 45% implied upside to the current share price. AI going from calculator to view-taker: what that shift means for how models should be used. CVC's Sproutz sale process: AI agent in the data room, and what it signals for banker fees. The debt-treatment miss: Fable 5's blind spot on lease liabilities. The economic question: at $50 in credits per model, is DIY still faster? WTBD Newsletter: https://webmail.wallstreetprep.com/whats-the-big-deal Follow Us On Socials: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/wall-street-prep/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/wallstreetprep/ Resources: https://linktr.ee/wallstreetprep

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  Episode #20

  Private Equity Faces a 9-Year Backlog. Here's Why.

  Jul 9, 202614 minS1

  US private equity firms now face a 9-year backlog of unsold portfolio companies at the current pace, according to new PwC and PitchBook analysis. Roughly 13,500 companies sit in PE portfolios as of June 30, with nearly 4,000 held for 6+ years and 1,500 held for 9+ years. Fundraising has collapsed alongside, with only $159.6 billion raised in H1, on track to match 2025's muted total. In this episode, Debs and Graham dig into Bain's private equity report and unpack the structural pressures behind the slowdown, which explain why financial sponsor transaction volume is down 9% year-on-year even as broader deal activity has hit records. The conversation opens with the strategic vs. financial buyer dynamic. In a period of uncertainty, financial sponsors are more resistant to defensive punts because they need to underwrite specific return targets in a highly uncertain environment. Beyond the motivational split, Graham walks through the structural pressures on PE returns. Cost of leverage has risen with floating-rate debt getting more expensive in a hawkish rate environment. Purchase price multiples remain elevated (Bain calls it a "deal cost index" at all-time highs). High entry combined with high cost of debt makes it structurally harder to underwrite the returns PE requires. Software exposure is the other major theme. PE has historically been overweight software for good reasons (cash-generative, recurring revenue, pricing power), which now looks vulnerable to what one analyst calls the "SaaS-alypse", the fear that AI will destroy the software space overnight. Graham is skeptical the collapse will be as sudden or sweeping as the narrative suggests, but the fear alone is enough to spook LPs and put pressure on private credit funds that back PE deals. The result is a broader machine slowdown. Holding periods have extended from the traditional 5 years to 7 years on average, which erodes IRR. LPs aren't getting their capital back at expected pace. New fundraising is more difficult. Only the highest-quality assets are trading, which means the remaining book is likely lower-quality than the marks suggest, creating further LP hesitation. Continuation vehicles have become one workaround, but Graham flags that they carry their own LP concerns around marking and capital return. The episode closes on what would need to change: more clarity on the software/AI trajectory, and PE firms doing what they can, running existing assets as well as possible until exit conditions improve. Key Discussion Points: The 9-year backlog: 13,500 portfolio companies and a fundraising collapse to $159.6bn in H1 Strategic vs. financial buyers in uncertainty: why sponsors sit tight while corporates move Cost of leverage pressure: floating rates and rising interest bills eroding equity returns The Bain "deal cost index" and elevated purchase multiples Software exposure and the "SaaS-alypse" fear: overblown or real? Extended holding periods (5 years to 7 years) and IRR compression The best assets sold first: what that means for LP confidence in remaining marks Continuation vehicles: solution or symptom of the broader slowdown? What could restart the PE deal machine What's the Big Deal? is an educational podcast covering deals and market developments in public and private markets. Nothing in this episode constitutes financial advice. WTBD Newsletter: https://webmail.wallstreetprep.com/whats-the-big-deal Follow Us On Socials: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/wall-street-prep/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/wallstreetprep/ Resources: https://linktr.ee/wallstreetprep

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