Analyst Incentive Structures

A lot of posts on this site about $ pay levels, but not much about actual incentive structures (i.e. I'm more interested in how one gets paid vs what one gets paid for the purpose of this post). Curious what people have experienced over time? What did you like, what did you not like? What do you think would work and/or incent the right type of analyst behavior? I can tell you at my old firm, there was very little direct tie to personal contribution to the portfolio, and it was over-weighted to the aggregate, which I found very demotivating. Ex: I covered a smaller sector and like 40% of my outcome was dependent on our tech/com services analyst by definition. Curious what others have experienced and what has worked for them, paper portfolios, recommended lists, buy/sell/hold rating performance, # of names in the book, number of ideas generated in a given year, etc. What do you guys think works the best? What is the worst? 

8 Comments
 

I believe the bonus is calculated chiefly on a discretionary basis in most LOs. An investment arm for an insurance company would pay 25-50%, a small shop would pay 50-100%, and a benchmark hugging large managers would pay 100+%, but it is rarely based on a formula that delicately takes your individual performance into account. I'd be happy to learn if there are shops that do things differently.

 

Without being too specific:

Structure A: 60% target, 120% max.

80% quantitative/20% discretionary. Quantitative = 50% more direct portfolio; 50% broader definition portfolio (more of a composite). 1Y/Rolling 3Y formula 

Structure B: 125% target, 250% max

50/50 quant vs discretionary. Quant = combination of things at various weightings. 3Y rolling 

 

Should add that the quant vs discretionary mix of structure B is inconsistent with my comment "quantitative component has been larger in both instances". There are some quantitative measures within the qualitative piece that are not straight up performance vs a bench like # of ideas in a given year etc. that help drive the qual. The weightings of such measures are just not explicitly defined and as such they don't fall into the quantitative piece 

 

Odit eius distinctio perferendis qui. Nihil laboriosam voluptatem qui enim. Vitae cupiditate reprehenderit sit dignissimos.

Aliquam provident et nesciunt aut eum nobis dolorum. Commodi cumque odio inventore molestiae alias aut. Nesciunt dolores tenetur aut exercitationem odit dolorem necessitatibus. Quia illum vel eum fuga.

Career Advancement Opportunities

September 2026 Investment Banking

  • Evercore 01 99.5%
  • Moelis & Company 01 98.9%
  • Morgan Stanley 08 98.4%
  • JPMorgan No 97.9%
  • Goldman Sachs 02 97.3%

Overall Employee Satisfaction

September 2026 Investment Banking

  • Moelis & Company No 99.5%
  • Morgan Stanley 02 98.9%
  • Evercore 01 98.4%
  • Banco Santander 02 97.9%
  • BMO Capital Markets 12 97.3%

Professional Growth Opportunities

September 2026 Investment Banking

  • Evercore 01 99.5%
  • Moelis & Company 01 98.9%
  • Morgan Stanley 05 98.4%
  • Goldman Sachs 01 97.9%
  • JPMorgan No 97.3%

Total Avg Compensation

September 2026 Investment Banking

  • Vice President (16) $429
  • Associates (53) $259
  • 3rd+ Year Analyst (8) $210
  • 2nd Year Analyst (28) $184
  • Intern/Summer Associate (15) $159
  • 1st Year Analyst (84) $151
  • Intern/Summer Analyst (76) $101
notes
16 IB Interviews Notes

“... there’s no excuse to not take advantage of the resources out there available to you. Best value for your $ are the...”

Leaderboard

success
From 10 rejections to 1 dream investment banking internship

“... I believe it was the single biggest reason why I ended up with an offer...”