2023 Recruitment Official IB Rankings (Post-CS)
Sophomores, please use this as gospel during recruiting as these rankings have been verified by a committee at my target, the Wharton School.
Tier 1:
GS, MS, EVR, CVP, Qatalyst, PJT
Tier 3:
BofA, Citi, Barclays, PWP
Tier 3.5:
Guggenheim, Greenhill
Tier 4:
Jefferies, RBC, HL (M&A), LionTree
Tier 4.5:
Allen & Co, Raine, Gordon Dyal
Tier 5:
William Blair, Rothschild, Solomon, Ardea
Tier 5.5:
Baird, Ducera, FT Partners
Tier 6:
Wells Fargo, Piper Sandler, Raymond James, Harris Williams, TD Cowen
Tier 6.5:
Macquarie, BMO, Truist
Tier 7:
Stifel, DC Advisory, Stephens, Shea, Citizens
Tier 7.5
Mizuho, BGL
If your bank did not make the list it probably sucks pretty hard.
Expecting monkey shit will probably come from Rothschild/Solomon Partners analysts who think they are an EB, and RBC/WF analysts thinking they are a BB so do not have that distract you from the accuracy of this post.
OK Intern
Hey man I got all day to be on the website. Get back to modeling buddy.
Do you know how to count?
You're either at Lazard or Greenhill because those tiers are from 10+ years ago
Can we do something like Blind, make the professional forums only open to posting from verified professionals, and quarantine prospects to the job search forum?
Banning Wharton kids from the website would probably accomplish the same thing
skipped tier 2 lol
My bad I cant count
Redone by a professional. We can hairsplit, but the reality is most shops are pretty similar and equivalent. Top groups outperform rankings and there is variance at every bank.
Tier 1 (clear top)
GS, MS, EVR, CVP, Qatalyst,
Tier 1.5: (doesn’t limit exit options aside from like GS exclusive type shops)
JPM, PJT, Barclays, Citi, BofA, CS (unclear their future, but whatever spinoff occurs), Laz, PWP, Moelis
Tier 2: (Everyone respects your background if they have ever sold a company and aren’t an undergrad, or a first year)
UBS, DB, Gugg, Greenhill, Jeff, HL, WB
Tier 3: (Great shops that have a smaller recruiting presence, but you likely worked on legit deals, some even big ticket)
RBC, liontree, Allen, Raine, Gordon Dyal, Roth, Solomon, Ardea, Baird, FT, Ducera, Raymond, HW, Piper Sandler, WF
Tier 4: (You were a banking analyst, but let’s be honest, a shop above you likely want to lateral to)
Macquarie, BMO, Truist, TD, Stifel, DC Advisory, Stephens, Shea, Citizens, Mizuho, BGL
Tier 5: (the job function is a little different and you aren’t recruiting to a major PE shop) regional LMM IB banks
With all due respect this ranking is even worse than OP's. I don't know what your criteria is (exits, deal flow, analyst background), but your tier 1.5 and tier 2 rankings are completely off imo. Coming from a mid-level guy at Jefferies, there is no way that you can put Jefferies, HL, and WB at the same level as PWP, Moelis, and Lazard on exits and analyst background. Deal flow isn't even comparable given the very different business models between the companies.
How is 8 years of experience in IB and PE and a top MBA? It’s fine if you disagree, the reality is most these groups are pretty interchangeable. I was tempted to lump the whole middle together tbh, but kept a little rankings for spice.
I think once you have been in the industry for a few years, you just aren’t going to view a Moelis and Jeff guy different. Also, I think you are kidding yourself if you think those candidates aren’t able to get similar looks from UMM firms. As for “deal flow” it’s so group dependent, you have no idea. Does a top group at Moelis or Lazard prob outperform? Yeah, sure. But generally, no one is disrespecting the background of the shops in that category. You are working at an elite institution and each have various pros and cons.
A true professional wouldn't have jumped into the rankings circle-jerk with the prospects in the first place
I’m pooping man
If judging by exits, the rankings honestly just be:
Tier 1: GS (has all the looks everyone else gets + looks from certain shops that heavily prefer GS over everyone else eg. CD&R)
Tier 1.5: JPM, MS, Evercore, Lazard (step above Tier 2 in terms of consistency of exits every year, and no it's not fair to bifurcate PJT and put RSSG here when no other firm gets dissected by group in the rankings)
Tier 2: Mid-BBs + rest of the EBs
Tier 3: Top MMs and bottom BBs
Tier 4: Everyone else.
Anything more complex is unnecessary and stupid.
If judging by deal flow, it's completely dependent on firm, as each firm has different strengths (HW's arguably the best with generic MM sponsor sell-sides, Blair with MM Tech sponsor sell-sides, CVP and PWP at large-cap strategic advisory, PJT with RX, etc). If judging by place to work, that's wherever you enjoy the culture, have senior support and mentorship, and get responsibility.
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The disconnect between how Goldman employees view their competence and how everyone else views them is one of my favorite tropes. It’s not quite hbs level, but it’s close.
Yeah, this is incorrect. Everyone placing the BBs in their own tier has no idea what they're talking about. Maybe in the 2000s, but the fact is that the smartest and most hardo kids have been increasingly snatched by EBs, and objectively those kids are the ones who do the best on-cycle.
A top group at a top EB kills even top groups at top BBs on a person-for-person basis any day. re "GS-exclusive shops" - you are not using one of your two on-cycle chances to apply to CD&R if you can get APO/BX/KKR - which is somewhat likely if HALF of your entire analyst class is headed there.
Just go to APO's LinkedIn page yourself and see where the associates come from. A cursory look at LinkedIn also shows countless people who have left top groups at GS/MS from the summer for FT at an EB (GS TMT NY --> Q, GS FIG --> HL RX, JPM HC --> PJT RSSG), but never the other way around.
I love how interns / college kids always chime with EB > BB despite 5+ employees at actual PE shops on this literal thread agreeing that GS/MS > the rest. i think recruiting so early in college makes college kids think EB > BB until they get actual work experience and realize EBs go first because they're afraid all the good kids will go to GS/MS.
Just as a heads up, EBs do go first and so often they get the kids who prepared the earliest. Those same kids are likely going to be prepared for PE recruiting which is why you'll see representation at certain PE shops. Its very much a function of correlation rather than causation that may not be clear until you've experience PE recruiting.
Hold on - I am not disagreeing with you. Past a certain point, all this prestige-tiering bullshit is useless because you'll get interviews at the places you want, and then it depends on how much you kill the interviews. My original point was that "placing the BBs in their own tier" is blatantly incorrect for that exact reason, as well as saying "GS/MS > the rest".
I said that top EB groups kill top BB groups in terms of on-cycle placements, not because of the name, but because candidates are generally more prepped and/or sharper (having a 10-person class also makes it statistically easier to place 50%+ into MF/UMM). But this also means that the kids who self-select into top EBs are thereby much more likely to fit this profile and do better on-cycle. Anecdotes from employees working at PE shops are useful, but they're just that -- anecdotes and personal perspectives. I also know multiple PE professionals who came from and thus favor EB kids.
If you want to look at an objective metric, APO took this year's ASO class almost entirely from PJT and EVR. There's a similar slant to their past ASO classes. Just like how CD&R favors GS over everyone else, you could say the same about other MFs heavily favoring certain EB groups.
Does this make them better than everyone else? No! But people on this thread are arguing it does for GS/MS, which I don't believe to be true.
PJT isn't tier 1, this isn't an RX ranking. Might as well put HL at Tier 1 at that point. PWP is a notch above Bofa, Citi, Barclays but under 1.5.