Toronto to New York

Currently a 1st year associate at an Canadian Big 5 bank in the middle market (not capital markets, part of commecial banking ib).

Was recently offered an S&T sales role in New York via internal transfer but the role will be as a sales analyst on one of the best teams on the floor.  Is it worth switching to sales and with title downgrade from associate to analyst, from a middle market Canadian Ib role? Pay-wise, the New York role pays double with adjusted for FX. 

What do you guys think?

 
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I made a midmarket >> big 5 IB >> NYC office of big 5 move.  Best move of my life.  Would I do midmarket IB in Canada >> S&T associate?  Probably because the career opportunities here are much more but a couple things to keep in mind:

a. You might be doing an L-1B intracompany visa (correct me if I'm wrong); that visa is pretty bespoke to the job so transferring internally again to IB may be difficult and transferring to another bank altogether might not even be possible.  TN visa is more flexible but big problem is not a clear path to green card vs L1B which is a direct path

b. Do not make the mistake of translating FX into a comp bump.  As an S&T guy, you're probably going to get familiar with Purchasing Power Parity, nevermind the much higher COL in NYC (but mostly that's rent TBH, additionally people spend a lot more money on a discretionary basis as well because there's WAY more to do vs Toronto) 

 

I made a midmarket >> big 5 IB >> NYC office of big 5 move.  Best move of my life.  Would I do midmarket IB in Canada >> S&T associate?  Probably because the career opportunities here are much more but a couple things to keep in mind:

a. You might be doing an L-1B intracompany visa (correct me if I'm wrong); that visa is pretty bespoke to the job so transferring internally again to IB may be difficult and transferring to another bank altogether might not even be possible.  TN visa is more flexible but big problem is not a clear path to green card vs L1B which is a direct path

b. Do not make the mistake of translating FX into a comp bump.  As an S&T guy, you're probably going to get familiar with Purchasing Power Parity, nevermind the much higher COL in NYC (but mostly that's rent TBH, additionally people spend a lot more money on a discretionary basis as well because there's WAY more to do vs Toronto) 

Thanks. 

a) Yes, would be L1 visa. I probably won't be able to return to IB afterwards due to skills sets not being transferable back, and visa restrictions. Do you think it would be worth it for an analyst level role in sales?

b) COL is pretty much higher in Toronto these days relative to salary. A 1 bedroom downtown is 3k now. So pay + COL factored in, NYC still wins.

 

I made a midmarket >> big 5 IB >> NYC office of big 5 move.  Best move of my life.  Would I do midmarket IB in Canada >> S&T associate?  Probably because the career opportunities here are much more but a couple things to keep in mind:

a. You might be doing an L-1B intracompany visa (correct me if I'm wrong); that visa is pretty bespoke to the job so transferring internally again to IB may be difficult and transferring to another bank altogether might not even be possible.  TN visa is more flexible but big problem is not a clear path to green card vs L1B which is a direct path

b. Do not make the mistake of translating FX into a comp bump.  As an S&T guy, you're probably going to get familiar with Purchasing Power Parity, nevermind the much higher COL in NYC (but mostly that's rent TBH, additionally people spend a lot more money on a discretionary basis as well because there's WAY more to do vs Toronto) 

Thanks. 

a) Yes, would be L1 visa. I probably won't be able to return to IB afterwards due to skills sets not being transferable back, and visa restrictions. Do you think it would be worth it for an analyst level role in sales?

b) COL is pretty much higher in Toronto these days relative to salary. A 1 bedroom downtown is 3k now. So pay + COL factored in, NYC still wins.

Gotcha, good luck with it all and yes, still seems worth it to me.  Wouldn't discount being able to come back into IB; I hear you about skill sets not being transferable but the job market is much deeper stateside.  I'm shopping for a one-bedroom right now and it's pretty much all 5-6k in Manhattan (in areas I want) so close to double that of Toronto.  Very hot areas like Greenwich village are even more.  But yes, more than offset by pay difference generally.

 

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