let's tell you what’s inside The
Financial Modeling Academy

 This course gives you a detailed grounding in 3-statement modeling and prepares you to take the Advanced Financial Modeler Examinations offered by the Financial Modeling Institute which offers the worlds leading accreditations in Financial Modeling. Successful completion of this academy will give you the privilege of earning the AFM Designation from the FMI.

We will start with two Primer courses: Microsoft Excel Fundamentals for Analysts & Fundamental skills for Financial Modeling, then you complete the core program, the 6-week intensive Financial Modeling Academy, You participate in weekly live Q&A's and community activity, once you complete the Academy, we will enrol you in our Financial Modeling Exam Preparatory course which includes hours of video, Live Mock exams, Live Mock exam review sessions and a lot more. You will then re-confirm your preferred exam date and write the FMI exam to earn the AFM Designation. 

Primer Courses
Microsoft Excel  & Fundamental Skills for Financial Modeling

To start you off you will gain immediate access to some courses that will give you a the foundational skills you need to be fully engaged in the core program. Here you will learn Microsoft Excel, Accounting, finance and the basic elements of financial modeling to prep you for the main course.

Modules covered

• Working with Excel Functions: Text, Date & Time, Rounding and Lookup functions
• Mastering Time Value of Money Calculations with Excel
• Mastering Scenario & Sensitivity Analysis in Excel: from Scenario Manager to custom solutions with Form Controls
• Mastering Logical Calculations in Excel: AND, OR, XOR, NOT, IF, IFS, SWITCH, Masks, Flags and more
• Introduction to Financial Modeling & its components
• Understanding the concept of Drivers and Predictive Power in Financial Modeling
• All about Schedules and forecasting techniques in Financial Modeling
• Building a Quick Financial Model from Scratch

Module 1
Building your Model Structure & Framework

In this module, you will learn how to plan the layout and structure of your model like a professional. The structure you build at the end of this module can be used for all your future financial models. Taking the time to do things properly will pay serious dividends. This module will also give you a great overview of the work that goes into building real-world financial models.

Lessons covered:

• Preparing the Model Guide Sheet
• Building Model Details Section
• Documenting Model Timings
• Listing the Model Sheet Structure
• Building the Styles Section
• Names & Glossary Sections
• Building Audit Check Section
• Building Version Control Section
• Documenting with Outlines
• Implementing a Row & Column Structure for the Model Sheets
• Automating Sheet Structure Timing
• Inserting Actual and Forecast Flags
• Setting up the Sheets for Printing
• Finalising your Model Sheet Structure  Framework

Module 2
Restructuring the Historical Financials: Profit or Loss Account

When building financial models for an existing corporate, you need to thoroughly review and analyse the audited financial statements and then normalize the financials. By normalizing, we mean removing the accounting noise inherent in the financials to enable you to build financial statements tied to drivers that have predictive power. This module takes you through the steps to normalize (aka Restructure) the Profit or Loss Account. A bit like financial engineering, you will have fun with this one! 

Lessons covered:

• Defining a Preferred PorL Structure
• Creating a Template for accurate Restructuring
• Restructuring Process for the Profit or Loss account
• Extracting the Depreciation and Impairment Values
• Dealing with incomplete information
• Normalizing the cost of sales & extracting associated depreciation
• Normalizing the SG&A & extracting associated depreciation
• Normalizing Net Finance Cost
• Normalizing Current and Deferred Tax Expenses
• Reconciling the normalized Profit or Loss to the Audited Accounts

Module 3
Restructuring the Historical Financials: Balance Sheet

In this module, we continue the work of restructuring (normalizing) the financial statements by restructuring the balance sheet. Like the previous module, your goal is to build a model that forecasts the company's financials as accurately as possible. Accountants use IFRS or US GAAP rules to build the financials, you need to use Predictive financial drivers, thus the need to restructure. See why you need a bit of accounting knowledge! but not to worry; we got you covered in this module.

Lessons covered:

• Purpose of normalizing the Balance Sheet
• Restructuring non-Current Assets
• Restructuring of Trade and Other Receivables
• Some peculiar Accounting Treatments and how to resolve them
• Treating allowances for credit losses and other payables
• Reconciling restructured values with audited account values
• Restructuring all other Assets
• Restructured Trade and Other Payables
• Treating loans and borrowings
• Extracting Equity Values
• Smart & Efficient Technique for building out the Restructured Balance Sheet  
• Finalizing your Financial Statement Normalization
• Adjusting for potential unbalanced Audited balance sheet
• Building the reconcile check tool for the balance sheet
• Creating an outline for a good interface and navigation

Module 4
Extracting Financial Drivers & Base Assumptions

In this Module, we will determine the best drivers for each line item of restructured financial statements. We will then use the historical financial values to compute base assumptions for the model. We will then build a scenario tool around assumptions that pose the greatest risk to the accuracy of our forecasts e.g. Revenue growth rate, inflation rates etc. The great work you did in restructuring the financials in the previous modules will begin to make a lot of sense now.

Lessons covered:

• Build out the Balance Sheet and Profit or Loss Sheets Linking to the Restated Financials 
• Build out the Structure/sections of the assumptions sheet
• Identify Drivers for each line item of the Financial Statements
• Compute the historical trends based on identified drivers
• Propagate base assumptions for the  forecast period based on historical trends
• Build out all Financing Assumptions & determine cash sweep accounts
• Carry out a risk analysis of drivers and determine assumptions that require multiple scenarios
• Build out the Scenario Analysis Template

Module 5
Financial Modeling Computation Mechanics

In this module you will build out the computations sheets containing all the schedules you need to build out your Financial Statements (Profit or Loss, Balance Sheet & Cash Flow Statements). Lots and lots of computations here, we will leverage on your Excel, Accounting and Analysis knowledge here, so if you haven't done the Primer courses, you may need to take another look at them. Fasten your seat belts and learn the Mechanics of Financial modeling computations in this module. 

 Lessons covered:

• Build out the structure for Profit or Loss Computations
• Complete all profit or loss computations
• Build all the schedule templates for Balance Sheet computations
• Build out all Linked Assumption tables in preparation for model mechanics
• Compute all schedules for the balance sheet
• Build a smart schedule for all financial calculations
• Link all computations to the Profit or Loss and Balance Sheet
• Build out the Cashflow statement
• Carry out steps to balance the Balance Sheet
• Build in circularity switches and complete the model build 

Module 6
Finalizing your Model, Analysis & Visualisations

You have made it to the Financial Module for building 3-statement financial models. Here you will stress test your model, correct for circular reference errors and build out a robust analysis sheet with DuPont Analysis and analysis Charts. Also, we will simulate the updating of historical values, with the latest audited accounts and insert a DCF Valuation module to the Model.

Lessons covered:

• Detailed debt computations with Cash Flow Waterfalls & cash sweeps
• Perform the 1 Check for Model Accuracy
• Build out the Analysis Sheet Structure
• Compute DuPont Analysis, Efficiency, Profitability, and Leverage ratios
• Insert a DCF Valuation Module
• Build out Sensitivity analysis Tables
• Build useful charts and visualisations
• Complete the Summary Sheet with useful information and Scenario Links
• Download the Latest Audited Accounts of the Company and Update the Historical Financials
• Compare the share price of the Company with your Valuation Analysis
• Do a final review of the assumptions and drivers sense check the model