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M&A Finance: Valuation and Deal Design

In this Specialization, you’ll learn how finance teams and deal professionals measure value creation, value businesses, and design M&A deals that hold up under real assumptions. You’ll begin with core corporate finance: using financial statements to build ratios, assess financial health, forecast cash flows, and manage short- and long-term liquidity. You’ll then apply valuation and investment decision tools—including discount rates, risk and uncertainty, and performance evaluation—so you can judge whether a project or acquisition creates shareholder value. Next, you’ll move into the finance of mergers and acquisitions, focusing on how to value and price deals and choose the financing mix. You’ll examine how leverage changes the cost of capital and can affect stock price, and how transactions shift a company’s capital structure. You’ll also work with major deal types, including strategic M&A, private equity leveraged buyouts (LBOs), and restructuring transactions such as spinoffs and asset transfers, using a consistent set of valuation and decision frameworks. By the end of this Specialization, you will be able to: Build ratio-based assessments and cash flow forecasts to evaluate value creation and liquidity needs Estimate discount rates, incorporate risk, and compute NPV to evaluate deals for acquirers and targets Value synergies and translate assumptions into pricing and financing decisions for different deal structures

Status: Risk Management
Status: Bidding
IntermediateSpecialization

Top reviews across M&A Finance: Valuation and Deal Design

JF

Reviewed Feb 3, 2019

Great course! I felt that I learned quite a bit. My undergrad is Finance and I feel that this course covered more topics and in more depth than my previous university studies.

PS

Reviewed Apr 27, 2022

T​he course covers the hard and soft aspects in detail that are involved in M&A in structured manner. It was amazing learning them, heading for subsequent courses offered in this series.

GS

Reviewed May 21, 2022

Professor Almeida makes topics easy to understand and it is a pleasure to learn from him.Material, class, quizes, case studies and examples support well the learning.

AS

Reviewed Jun 11, 2019

An excellent course and probably one of the finest on offer. Valuable learnings even for finance professionals like me. Highly recommended for all management students and managers.

MI

Reviewed Oct 23, 2025

Great teacher. A good course with excellent questions that highlights a key nuance in investment analysis.

RF

Reviewed Jul 18, 2023

Quite good course, demands lots of dedication but totally worth it. (it contains lots of calculations) You will do well as long as you are organized and take notes during the lessons.

RA

Reviewed May 20, 2021

This is a very interesting course to Corporate Finance. It provides you with the fundamentals for Project evaluation, Forecasting cash and financing needs, and Merges and Acquisitions.

MM

Reviewed Mar 19, 2022

A very systematic course with great examples and practice !

GW

Reviewed May 9, 2019

The course is well a positive challenge as well as a great oneIt was the best challenge On to the next with much enthusiasm Be blessed

KR

Reviewed May 11, 2023

The certificate does not specify the name of the candidate. Otherwise a good course. Learned a lot!

SS

Reviewed Feb 8, 2020

I found this course to be engaging and interesting. The content was explained well. I greatly appreciate what I have learned from this course, and feel it will be helpful in my future endeavors.

DH

Reviewed Nov 15, 2023

From my view, you need to have some background in finance. The course is well explained and practical

Learner reviews across M&A Finance: Valuation and Deal Design

Showing: 20 of 196

Andras
Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
5.0
Reviewed Feb 4, 2020Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
Stephen
Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
5.0
Reviewed Feb 9, 2020Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
Sundarakrishnan
Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
5.0
Reviewed May 4, 2020Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
Amit
Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
5.0
Reviewed Sep 11, 2017Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
Arvind
Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
5.0
Reviewed Jun 12, 2019Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
Sudhan
Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
5.0
Reviewed Feb 11, 2019Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
Subhodeep
Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
5.0
Reviewed Sep 14, 2017Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
Jason
Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
5.0
Reviewed Jun 16, 2020Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
COLLIN
Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
4.0
Reviewed Jun 11, 2017Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
José
Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
5.0
Reviewed Feb 14, 2017Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
Mohamed
Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
5.0
Reviewed Jun 22, 2020Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
Gaurav
Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
5.0
Reviewed Sep 16, 2017Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
Dr.
Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
5.0
Reviewed Aug 7, 2020Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
Jafed
Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
5.0
Reviewed Jul 6, 2019Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
John
Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
5.0
Reviewed Oct 31, 2019Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
Rodrigo
Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
5.0
Reviewed May 21, 2021Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
Joe
Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
5.0
Reviewed Feb 4, 2019Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
Fangfang
Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
5.0
Reviewed Jun 20, 2020Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
FELICITO
Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
5.0
Reviewed Sep 26, 2020Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
Kazuma
Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation
5.0
Reviewed Jun 13, 2019Course: Corporate Finance I: Measuring and Promoting Value Creation