Bonuses - Quite high this year

this year will be a strong one as well..but may not be as high as last year's.

I think bonuses are here to stay (as long as you weather the next downturn in the economy).

I heard 2nd year analyst was 100+ at BB

people in Ibanks are usually the first to go....so could be as bad as 0. Now depends on deal flow that your desk/dept sees at that time so coule be half of what you get now? (on the optimistic end).

The street was flooded with out of work bankers shortly after the dot.com bust. So this career comes with it share of risks - high risk = high return.

Having weathered the last downturn (2000-02), first/second year analyst pay was stagnant at $10k to $35k for both years (depending on how well you were ranked). That was roughly half what they were making in the previous two years(99-00), as far as I could gather.

Your biggest worry in a downturn is keeping your job at all (about 75% of my analyst class went in about 18 months). Although no-one goes home empty handed. If you're bottom-ranked, or your team gets culled, you'll still get a (small) golden parachute of $10k (which in the UK comes tax-free).

It's a depressing time to work in i-banking, that's for sure.

I agree with most of what's said up there, but one other consideration that is fairly obvious but important not to understate is which firm you're workign for. If you're working for a firm that's looking to grow a lot, then they'd mroe likely stop hiring than start firing.