Corporate Banking or Strategy Consulting for Internship?

Current sophomore who is thinking about options for SA recruiting. Personally, I am not interested in IB due to the poor WLB (just a personal preference), so that had me thinking about other high-paying career options that have better (admittedly not great) WLB. Two options that I thought would be interesting were Corporate Banking (BofA, Citi, Wells, JPM) or Strategy Consulting (most likely Tier 2). CB recruiting is happening now and consulting will happen later in the summer/fall.


From my understanding (and please correct me if I am wrong), Corporate Banking starts at $100-110 base with a 20-30% bonus with about 60-70 hours a week. Strategy Consulting starts at $100-110 base as well, with a 10-20% bonus and also 60-70 hours a week. So overall, from my research the two seem very similar in Comp and WLB.


Since I'm unsure about my exit goals right now, which career path would provide a somewhat stable career that is viable for the long haul, given the outlook right now for recruiting? Would appreciate any input from those who have worked in either.

 

Oh wow, I did not know that bonuses were that high, thank you for the insight. I go to a semi-target. 

In your experience in CB, what are some common exit opps? I know that staying in CB long-term is a popular long-term option due to the WLB, but are Corp Dev/Strategy and Restructuring/Management/Strategy Consulting possible?

 
Most Helpful

I think corporate banking is a great career path and one I wish I had explored more while in college or even my first couple of year in public accounting. I am not sure what exit opportunities are like, likely a lot of folks go to treasury or corporate finance groups, maybe private credit, or laterals to other banking groups. All of the corporate bankers I work with are great folks, it is much more of a relationship role at the VP/director levels but the couple of associates and analysts I've met seem nice. Their day to day seems like working in financing models, working on financing and pitch decks, providing (sales, coverage, etc.) materials to current borrowers, and reviewing covenant compliance and other materials provided by current borrowers. My interaction with the more senior roles besides our financing transaction work have been lunches and other meetings with other groups in the bank to cross-sell us on banking/treasury products, asset-based-lending, hedging, ESG related stuff etc. Hope this helps!

 

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