pretty chill first round second round case study focused on understanding how to approach a company from a credit investor perspective. not sure what third round will be but we shall see.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
10 dollar depreciation 10% tax three statement impact
I applied through an employee referral. I interviewed at Ares Management (Chicago, IL) in Jan 2026
Interview
First round: Basic behavioral, then difficult PC technicals
Overall, make sure to know cash flow sweep LBO questions, fixed and variable cost questions, PC metrics, and FCF vs LFCF
This is a difficult interview, make sure you can do mental math, and have a pen and paper ready.
Three to four rounds of interviews before a superday. Interviewers seemed pretty nice and the questions I got weren’t too difficult. Communication with HR was fairly straightforward and smooth, but got ghost at the end about the final decision.
Direct Lending Summer Analyst applicants have rated the interview process at Ares Management with 3 out of 5 (where 5 is the highest level of difficulty) and assessed their interview experience as 67% positive. To compare, the company-average is 60.9% positive. This is according to Glassdoor user ratings.
Common stages of the interview process at Ares Management as a Direct Lending Summer Analyst according to 3 Glassdoor interviews include:
One on one interview: 100%
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