"The Pulse" --#77 / U.S. & Mexico ❤️

Recruiting Timeline:

Banking:

Where We’re At:

• SA 2026: Rothschild opened its summer 2026 app. 6 firms are actively recruiting for summer 2026 positions

• To get everyone prepped before Winter Break, we want to meet with your undergraduate business/finance organization! Free of charge. Our coaches (including Pete the intern) will walk through insider insights on what YOU NEED to do before the end of winter break to crush interviews. Hit Pete’s line: [email protected] to set something up

• FT 2025: No new updates here. There are currently 61 firms actively recruiting for FT 2025. Please reach out if you are looking for coaching!

New SA 2026 Applications:

• Rothschild: European-centered boutique, strong restructuring practice (SA 2026)

New FT 2025 Applications:

• None

See below to gain access to our premium database, updated weekly, which houses the application processes for over 300+ banks/consulting/buyside firms! Gain an edge over everyone else by not having to spend countless hours tracking applications and deadlines

Consulting:

Where We’re At:

• 51 SA 2025 applications have been released along with 55 FT 2025 apps. This process is complete with the exception of small boutique firms.

*We updated the networking contacts in the premium database so take advantage of that resource

SA 2025 released apps:

• Pointe Advisory - Consulting Intern (SA 2025)

FT 2025 released apps:

• None

Apply ASAP if you’re interested!

Buyside:

Where We’re At:

• SA 2026: GTCR announced its application. Currently 7 buyside firms are recruiting for SA 2026 seats

New SA 2026 released apps:

• GTCR: $30bn AUM pureplay PE shop in Chicago (SA 2026)

The database is updated weekly and contains 300+ Investment Banking and Consulting internships/full-time positions along with:

• Interview tips for specific companies

• Interview prep material

• Applications and deadlines linked so that you can apply with one click

• Insider information about the application process

• Professionals to network with

• Buyside deadlines, interview prep, and people to network with for the sweatiest of students

We send the updated dataset every week with the latest banking and consulting job postings. We released our 77th update today.

Students we have been helping have already landed roles at Blackstone, Goldman, J.P. Morgan, Jefferies, Citi, and Solomon.

To get access to the database and the weekly updates, you pay a one-time fee of $50 (Venmo: ThePulsePrep / Credit Card: (ThePulsePrep—Stripe.com) that grants you annual access to the updated database (You can enable purchase protection if concerned). If you don’t find our services helpful, we simply ask for feedback on an area we can improve upon and will refund your $50.

This is a small investment for a huge payout when you secure your dream offer!

Video of Premium Database——>The Pulse Database Video

Market Update:

The U.S. Loves Mexico, What About China?

Mexico is the largest trading partner of the U.S. China held that crown for a long, long time and lost it in 2023.

However, has China really lost the crown? Or are they throwing billions of dollars to invest in Mexico to run their businesses via the sidedoor?

First, we need to start with the USMCA: The U.S. - Mexico -Canada Agreement inked in 2020.

Without getting too gritty in the details, this agreement brought the U.S., Mexico, and Canada back to the table to strengthen their relationship in a world that became much smaller during Covid.

Agreements to boost trading of goods related to the auto industry, manufacturing industries, and agriculture were enacted by the USMCA.

As Covid spread around the globe, supply chains got totally fucked. Shipping, airlines, and any other cross-continental transportation came to a halt. This only bolstered the reliance of the U.S. on geographically convenient trading partners like Mexico and Canada.

In particular, Mexico flourished because of its ability to supply cheap labor to produce goods. A similar dynamic to China. According to Ares, the average hourly wage in Mexico is $4.50 vs. $5.68 in China, all things considered. That’s a roughly 21% delta in cost savings when moving from China to Mexico.

Ngl, my hourly wage ain’t much better these days

As Covid was structurally weakening the international supply chain, the U.S. and China also entered into a trade war. Tariffs on Chinese imports were hiked from 3.1% in 2018 to 19.3% today. Trump’s election should only lead to greater tariffs—possibly to 60%!

That’s a one, two knockout for the attractiveness of trading with China. No one likes paying more for the same shit! You, Apple, and me included.

Ok, but is there concentration risk shifting to Mexico?

The short answer is no. Peep the graph above to see how China lost ~9 points of market share which ended up getting distributed in small pieces across a few countries.

Now, let’s revisit the first question I posed. Is China two steps ahead? Have they been moving business / investing in Mexico alongside the shift towards U.S. nearshoring?

The sidedoor is open and China is exploiting it. By investing into Mexican businesses or by moving some operations to Mexico, China can escape the deadly tariffs, horrible shipping costs, and comparatively expensive labor.

Btw, $4bn of Chinese investment in Mexico isn’t a lot, but that’s just reported data. Mexican regulatory bodies and government agencies don’t really have the oversight to track every $ of Chinese influence. So, take that graph more as a proxy of direction vs. true volume.

So, who can you trust? Are we equally dependent on China for imports today as we were 5 years ago?

I’d be remiss to not give full credit to Ares for inspiring this week’s update. Check it out here: Ares Whitepaper

Disclosure: Nothing written here is financial advice or should be used for investment decisions.

WACC

In case you missed our latest Technical Thursday: WACC, today we are going to discuss the Weighted Average Cost of Capital.

The weighted average cost of capital (WACC) is core to every job that involves valuation. Specifically, you'll be applying a WACC as the discount rate in a DCF

Think of the WACC as more or less a hurdle return rate a company needs to meet when investing in a project

Calculation: ((cost of debt x (1-tax rate) x % debt in the capital structure)) + (cost of equity x % equity in the capital structure) ✅ 

^sounds complicated, just memorize it

Inputs:

-Cost of Debt: interest rate of the debt ✅ 

-Tax Rate: whatever tax rate impacts the given company. This is applied because interest expense is tax deductible ✅ 

-% Debt in the Capital Structure: See image below for a visual. It is the proportional amount of debt a company uses to fund its business ✅ 

-Cost of Equity: risk-free rate + beta x the market risk premium ✅ 

^will touch more upon this next week

-% of Equity in the Capital Structure: See image below for a visual. It is the proportional amount of equity a company uses to fund its business ✅

Now that we dropped a few equations and definitions, we can move on with our discussion

We can’t understand WACC without understanding capital structures

A capital structure is essentially the composition of the right side of the balance sheet 

A capital structure is a breakdown of the tools (debt and equity) used to fund the purchasing + maintenance of the assets for a business

Capital structures look very different across different industries. Check out "The Pulse" --#74 / Different Industries, Different Profiles 

Capital structures mirror the same principle

-Different companies within an industry have a similar capital structure, but companies within different industries often have very different capital structures

So a WACC is really just a blended average of the costs of the different tools used to finance the assets of a company

Therefore, it serves as the minimum rate of return a company needs to generate on its investments/projects. WACC is famously used in a DCF as the discount rate applied to the projected cash flows 💸 

A good-looking WACC from my experience is anywhere from 7-15% ✅

I challenge you, now that the corporate tax rate might be reduced from 21% → 15%, will WACCs increase or decrease?

Going Forward:

If you run a club, we want to connect with you to partner. Please shoot us an email @[email protected], would love to make your club the most prepared on campus

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• Pay for 3, get one FREE = $150. (Venmo @ThePulsePrep or Credit Card: (Coaching Bundle $150 for 4 Sessions)

• 1 hour session = $50. (Venmo @ThePulsePrep or Credit Card: ThePulsePrep—Stripe.com

• 30-minute session = $30. Venmo @ThePulsePrep or Credit Card: ThePulsePrep—Stripe.com

• Email us with your availability and we will be happy to schedule a session @[email protected] 

Students we coached for SA 2025 received offers at Goldman, JP Morgan, Evercore, and many other firms. Roughly 95% of those coached received offers last year!

Please reach out to us with any questions about recruiting or if you’re interested in meeting the team! ([email protected])

We are happy to chat, review resumes, or help set up a coaching session

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“The Pulse” #77