UBS vs Barclays
I have recently been given opportunities to work in IB for both firms. I wanted to see if anyone has any advice on how to approach this decision.
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SA FT or lateral?
SA
I'll leave it to my fellow monkeys to go into details about prestiegeand league tables but aside from that don't discount the question of where you would rather work. If you have a preference between the people that you've met / general culture that you've experienced don't discount that.
Most important thing is absolutely this. Especially because they are both solid banks and group-agnostic.
Once you've made a decision, let us know because we can opine on individual groups.
Is it group specific?
Generalist offer but I would appreciate group advice as well
not sure about Ubs but at RBC and Barclays you do a selection process. Both banks have great teams and weaker teams. One cool thing about barcalys is that most of the coverage teams do most of the execution work. Things aren't sourced to product teams as much (sort of how goldman does it) so if you have a specific industry you want to focus on you can still do plenty of modeling work. I know barclays Power, Oil and Gas and FIG are all strong. Probably plenty more.
Also UBS leadership doesn't seem to know if it wants to grow the IB business or the WM business. Focus seems on WM
Where?
If London, go for Barclays. It's the shorter commute.
Nyc
.
Would pick Barclays NY over UBS NY. At Barclays you get to do M&A and execution in coverage groups which is a valuable experience if you want to exit. Would note that Barclays' culture is pretty unique (traditional banker feel) so do take a look at culture before deciding.
Barclays or UBS (Originally Posted: 02/14/2010)
I have an offer to both Barclays and UBS IBD as a SA. I was wondering which one would be the better?
Can't emphasize enough how important this part about execution is. Barclays basically discontinued taking new people into its M&A group a few years back and renamed the group to "exclusive sales" (I think that's what it's called) - basically mega deals that they are in a lead advisory position on. While this may be less fun if you're trying to come over as an associate or VP, at the analyst level, this is gold for you, bc it means you run the whole M&A process.
It SUCKS cramming a pitch or bakeoff all night, having your MD come back and announce you guys won the deal, and then handing the model over to the M&A team. If you have any likelihood of getting into a decent or better coverage group at Barclays, I would take it over UBS bc of this more than anything.
Barclays.
Can I ask why?
ex lehman bankers
...and whatever others have said
This topic has been discussed many times over. Its hard to give a definite answer but if everything else is equal, I think the general consensus ranking of the BBs would be:
Tier 1: GS/MS Tier 2: JPM Tier 3: Citi / BAML / Barclays / CS Tier 4: DB Tier 5: UBS / WF
Specifically for your situation, choose Barclays because of better dealflow.
This is correct. Some may argue DB is down there with Tier 5 as well due to their poor exit ops (many seem to stay associate or 3rd year due to bad exits). Also, MS is no longer above JPM and some have even told me MS is no longer "tier 1". Thus to consolidate this a bit:
Tier 1: GS/MS/JPM Tier 2: Citi/BAML/Barclays/CS Tier 3: DB/WF/UBS
BarCap is much stronger in the US than UBS
Are the tiers ordered too? ie: are you saying in Tier 2 Citi > BAML > BarCap > CS?
No, I didn't rank by tiers. BAML is probably better than Citi and I think MS is still better than JPM at least for M&A. Citi would actually be the weakest of the tier 2, even though I quoted the previous poster who put it first I think due to alphabetical order. Just arrange the tiers in alphabetical order and go with whichever group and culture you like best. If you really want to be cynical it'd probably be GS in its own tier.
This also depends on group. I doubt people here would throw away UBS M&A or WF/DB Levfinsponsors for Citi capital markets or even a regular citi group, so the group matters along with culture.
depends if you're talking about dealflow, culture or prestige.
I think within the tiers, it is very very group dependent. You have to ask, what interests you and then go see which of the banks is strongest for your interest.
If it really came down to it, I would say that for Tier 1, GS has the highest prestige, where as JPM and MS have the best cultures. In Tier 2, Citi, BAML have good culture and dealflow. Barclays and CS have prestige. For Tier 3, DB has the prestige. Of course, this is just based off of my personal interactions with the firms and will probably be biased. In the end, choose where you feel you fit the best if you are choosing between Banks in the same Tier.
this is the easiest answer take barclays and dont look back, coming from someone who worked there, ubs is a total shithole. I agree with many other posters in other thread who say it is no longer bb here. 0 exit ops and everyone trying to flee. stealth fires and stubs on bonus. I get treated like crap everytime i ask to travel or more responsibility. boutiqueguy take ur list and erase ubs cuz the deals are horrible just like the bank.
Fubs, is UBS' reputation bad enough that having the name on your resume would be a point of shame?
No need to get carried away. its going to be worse for u guys. I got out and could claim 2006 and 2007 experiences before this shit went awry but the new kids will have to deal with the burden of having crappy dealflow and being totally middle market in deal size. I got out while i can but from now on exit ops will suck hard. The name itself reeks of failure but you shouldn't be ashamed of it since people still recognize it on a resume.
fubs, what do you think about comparing UBS M&A (their best group) vs the worst coverage groups in a 2nd tier BB like Citi, BAML, or CS
Take the 2nd tier BB as long as it's a coverage group and not capmkts. i'm not familiar with leagues anymore but ubs M&A has been doing poorly for the most part which i'm pretty sure they are last in among their old bb counterparts. I'm not familiar with those other banks but I would take them in a heartbeat over ubs, no question.
reallycoolguy, is there a reason GS TMT dominates so much and not MS? Is this mostly because of TMT? I see a lot of GS TMT for KKR and other megafunds at ratio of 3:1 to MS.
I'm not sure about KKR, but I know TPG and Carlyle usually take at least as many kids from MS as GS. Silver Lake also usually takes the same number of pre-MBA associates from GS TMT and MS Tech. Overall, however, there will be more GS analysts in megafunds, and the explanation for this is quite simple. These firms are looking for Pre-MBA associates who are proficient in M&A modeling, specifically of the LBO variety. Every single groups at GS executes on its own M&A deals, so there is a reasonable probability that every analyst in every group at GS has been exposed to M&A / LBO modeling. On the other hand, most groups at MS outsource modeling duties to MS M&A, with a few exceptions being Tech, FIG, and M&T (I'm not sure if this list is exhaustive). Consequently, analysts at GS are at a significant advantage when it comes to buyside recruiting, because more analysts from GS will have the prerequisite modeling skills.
I see, thanks.
yeah if u have questions and pmd me i deleted a few so just resend it
.
UBS HK for sure.
In HK? Well, the only thing that's hot in Asia atm is ECM, and generally for ECM it's UBS > BarCap. Regarding M&A, well, I don't think the Asian market is developed enough for there to be a definitive list. But for FY '09 M&A, UBS is 6th in completed rankings, whilst BarCap isn't on the list. For Asian ECM it's UBS #1, BarCap isn't on the list.
UBS S&T vs Barclays IBD (Originally Posted: 02/11/2011)
So decision time. Have offers from both UBS S&T and Barclays IBD. I have read a lot of the information out on the web about the differences in lifestyle, experience, work-style ect. Would love to get some more opinions from people in the business or with experience.
Current pros of S&T: More daily excitement for summer analyst cons : Not sure if trading is what I want to do for the next 5+ years of my life
Current pros of Barcap IBD: More holistic view of companies+skills=more flexible exit opps. cons : analyst work has min. client interaction, mostly editing pitchbooks
Like I said I am just looking for some more help and opinions from people who have experience in the fields and can offer some wisdom on the subject. I like both the banks, and both of the fields interest me, but the work is obviously very different.
I would lean towards Barclays. They're still holding their weight in US market whereas UBS may be retrenching with their higher focus in PWM. Both great banks though. If you have a top group in UBS vs non-dealmaking group at Barclays, this ultimately changes the decision.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-04-05/top-ubs-banker-orcel…
Looking at UBS tmt or industrials if that helps
Do you have any idea regarding where do you wanna be down the road? If not go for IBD. It's more of a jack of all trades...
Also wanted to add that if I go to Barclays I will most likely be in FIG
Yeah I mean this is really something that comes down to personality and interests IMO. Can you deal with 100 hour workweeks completing pitchbooks for 2 years? Would you rather take on risk and have your success literally shown by your p/l? I really look at it as a personality/risk tolerance question. Ibd is much safer in terms of job security and exit opps, while trading is much more fast paced(and in my view more fun honestly), but if you blow up and lose a lot, you'll be looking for some more work...
Yeah that is good advice. I invest my own money long term and from what I have seen and heard trading does sound very exciting. The only thing is that working at a smaller VC or PE fund sounds like something I would like to do long term, in which case IBD seems like the way to go.
I agree about Barclays, but both are great shops
UBS or Barclays? (Originally Posted: 09/25/2008)
Just got a call from a Lehman/Barclays recruiter saying that they are honoring the full-time offers for 2009 Investment Banking Analyst program.
If you had a full time offer from UBS and (what is now) Barclays, which would you take?
To me, the Barclays offer would seem to be more stable. You know what Barclays/Lehman went through and they are still holding your offer, who knows what UBS' future will be. Thats my take, but during these times, its really anyone's best blind guess.
UBS seems more stable to me. Nobody will know the full impact of Lehman-Barclays down the coming months and people are sill trying to figure things out. UBS has had some trouble but they're still in tact.
Why in the world would you even consider the Lehman-Barclays offer? Fuck what they tell you about honoring offers. The integration of those two banks is going to be a mess.
UBS had early troubles, but it's a lot more stable now than it was a few months ago. And, if you care about this, the UBS name clearly trumps Lehman-Barclays or whatever the hell they're going to call themselves.
I would definetly take Barclays. UBS has been heavily considering selling off its investment banking division.
didnt Bear recruiters assure the Bear/JPM people the same thing? a lot can change between now & July so just be careful
UBS ib is extremely uncertain right now
the ticking time bomb or whatever is hidden in this box.
Do research into Treasury, Fed Res., BoE and ECB sanctions.
Not all banks are equal.
Depends on which group you think you will be placed in (exits opps will highly depend on this) and where you liked the people more
I like the culture/people more at UBS. How would exit opps compare if I placed into TMT or industrials which are in the top bucket of groups.
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