Hey guys,
So I stumbled upon a really great contact who can get me interviews in any group (reasonable) I want at the following banks:
- Morgan Stanley
- Goldman Sachs
- Credit Suisse
- Citibank
- Bank of America
- Deutsche Bank
- JPM (maybe)
I am most interested in Technology IB. From my understanding, Technology is sometimes loped together Media and Telecom in the TMT group, or it might be spun off as a separate group.
Some brief research yielded that the dominant Technology groups are at GS and MS, followed by CS and JPM. Is this correct?
I 'm also a very mathematical oriented individual who is studying financial engineering as an undergraduate. Therefore I think I'd be a good fit for an Asset Management position where I'd be able to leverage my skill-set, such as portfolio construction or a quant-position that's not comp sci intensive
My question to all of you is two-fold:
- For each of the aforementioned banks, does their tech-banking group have a strong reputation? What about the their investment management business (ex private banking)?
- Can you think of any other front-office positions where I'd be able to leverage my interest in technology and/or mathematical skill-set? I'm not interested in trading.
Also, keep in mind that these positions have to be feasible for an undergraduate to get.
bump
Seems like a really solid contact you have. The technology groups at GS, MS, CS all have very strong reputations and are very competitive to break into. I am not sure about the others but those three are the strongest as far as I know. Not sure about other FO positions but banking in a tech group would be a great field to get into, I'm actually hoping to get into tech myself down the line. Good luck bro.
Thanks man -- the contact is a CFO of a large-cap technology company publicly traded on the NASDAQ. Turns out he's my third or fourth cousin. Considering my alter-ego as an e-entrepreneur, Tech IB is the perfect, realistic mix of my passion for technology and interest in banking.
Good luck to you too, and thanks for clearing that up. On a side note, would you say CS is on par with GS and MS? Are they as strong as they used to be with Quattrone?
Background: SA in a tech group (BB) so feel free to take what I say with a grain of salt.
So for most pitch books, there's generally a creds page ("my bank is the best for your company because we did x deal"). So, I'll give you some tech specific league tables. These numbers are around first half 2011.
Tech M&A (by volume): GS (30.7bn), MS (16.9bn), DB (14.6bn), JPM, BAML Tech M&A (by deals #): DB, MS, BAML, GS, CS
Don't have specific equity and debt numbers, but generally, for equity, it's MS, DB, CS, and then GS.
Cannot comment on prestige and exit opps. Obviously GS TMT or MS Menlo Park will give you access to megafunds (on either coast), but pretty much every BB will send you to a decent growth equity firm, which is definitely more interesting, in my opinion.
I would definitely go with the west coast office if you're interested in tech, specifically. It's a great place to be, as the companies are generally high growth. Dual track IPO/M&A makes for a great experience and it's far more interesting than raising debt for some shitty paper products company in Iowa.
Thanks for the insight -- very, very helpful info. Seems like DB is a significant player as well. I'm also set on the west coast.
Down the road, not sure if I want to work at a megafund or growth equity fund or maybe a more siloed, early-stage VC firm like Sequoia Capital.
Thanks for the inside info -- good stuff to know. Can anyone comment more on the culture of tech groups at MS, GS, DB, and JPM?
Qatalyst would be a dream. I didn't think about asking my contact about boutiques, but QP is most likely a stretch. They only have 20-something people on board right?
On a side note, it always great to touch base with another internet enthusiast. I do have some background in programming as it's one of the pillars of my major (the others being finance and math). I dabble in coding -- for example I coded my resume in LaTeX instead of typsetting it in MS Word. I know the chops of object oriented languages like Java/C/C++, but I have more expertise in scripting languages like VBA/Perl and also R (statistics).
However, I don't really have a passion for coding -- if I were to pursue e-entrepreneurship I'd be much more interested in business side of it, such as product design/marketing. You?
This might not be the most popular of commentary, but I have heard some incredibly critical comments, from Senior Bankers at other (top) shops and former (high-profile) banking clients, made about CS Tech in the post-Boutros era. Apparently it's gotten so bad that Analysts are jumping ship before they even find new jobs and that some mid-level and senior guys are transferring to DB, QP, and some of the other prominent SF tech shops.
Think UBS LA in the post Ken Moelis era...
I had heard CS Tech was a great group to get into but things can obviously change very quickly so the poster above is probably more accurate about the current state of that group. GS & MS have great reputations and seem to be a class above in tech. I doubt CS is as strong without Quattrone since he seems to be the king of tech. If your guy can get you an interview at Qatalyst that would be a great place to be but again all these places are very tough to break into. I also have an alter ego as an e-entrepreneur lol, do you have any experience with computer programming?
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