All firms

Lazard interview questions

21 questions researched across 1 Lazard seat in Financial Advisory. Below are 12 of them.

Seats we researched

  • Summer AnalystFinancial Advisory · intern · 20 min

12 Lazard interview questions

  1. Why is the cost of equity higher than the cost of debt? And could the cost of debt ever exceed the cost of equity?

  2. Revenue goes up by 30 dollars with 12 dollars of COGS. Walk me through the three statements, assuming a 25 percent tax rate.

  3. Depreciation falls by 10 dollars. Walk me through the three statements with a 30 percent tax rate.

  4. Walk me through the cash flow statement. What does negative working capital tell you about a business?

  5. Which valuation methodology usually produces the highest valuation, and why?

  6. A company will never generate positive revenue. Why might its shares still trade above zero?

  7. Why would a company acquire another on a dilutive basis?

  8. Walk me through the waterfall in a bankruptcy.

  9. Pick one experience on your résumé and walk me through a decision you made there and why you made it.

  10. Why an independent advisor like Lazard rather than a full-service bank?

  11. Walk me through a DCF.

  12. What happens to equity value in a restructuring?

What a strong answer does

The questions above fall into 3 kinds. What a strong answer does differs by kind, not by question.

Technical9 of 12 above
State the intuition first; walk through the mechanics; make assumptions explicit; test a risk or edge case; connect the answer to the role.
Behavioral2 of 12 above
Lead with the claim and context; isolate your personal action and decision; explain the trade-off; quantify the result; finish with what you learned and changed.
Case1 of 12 above
Clarify the objective; build a mutually exclusive structure; prioritize the highest-value branch; analyze with evidence; synthesize a recommendation, risks, and next step.

9 more Lazard questions

The rest of the bank — 21 in total — is asked by the interviewer during practice, so you meet them the way you would on the day rather than reading them first.

Practise Lazard questions

How these questions were researched

Every question carries a provenance grade. Some were reported by candidates who sat the round, some come from the firm’s own published guidance or a source that trains for it, and the rest are written to match how this firm asks. Each seat is studied on its own — the round it actually runs, the order it runs it in, and what it is listening for. A Lazard round is not a generic behavioural screen, and practising one as the other is how people walk in unprepared.

Falas is not affiliated with or endorsed by any employer named. Simulations are independent practice based on publicly described recruiting formats.