corporate finance at a large corp is an underrated exit opp if you enjoy financial modeling

Left IB a while back for a corporate finance role at a large public co and it's been an absolute dream. I know everyone typically does IB > PE, but I realized that there's a hidden gem of an exit opp in corporate finance but people don't think much of it because it's not as "prestigious" and people think of it as synonymous with FP&A. There's huge variability in this type of role, so it doesn't neatly fit into a box but typically I work on:

1. Financings - hitting up i-bank capital markets to issue debt and hybrid securities, occasionally equity issuances and buybacks

2. Working with i-banks to come up with potentially accretive opportunitistic M&A, modeling potential divestitures

3. Modeling out different financing scenarios using different sources of financing (equity vs debt)

4. Working with credit rating agencies and their models

This isn't pure corpdev, so WLB is great since it isn't deal based in the same way. When deals do happen, we typically have a pretty big budget for hiring a full-service bank so they do a lot of the nitty-gritty marketing

I'm at about 200k TC and work 30-50 hours a week, mostly remote. Best part though is that I'm just analyzing and financial modeling all day, which is what I've always enjoyed and find easier than making marketing materials.

I will caveat that you'd probably find the job to be not worth it if you're a fan of the "soft skills" side of IB, since it's almost all analytical excel shenanigans, but I think there's definitely a crowd that enjoys that more. What I found most difficult in banking is constantly being a client-facing marketing material factory so glad I was able to find a happy medium between IB, PE, and other more mundane corporate jobs

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This is probably where most of the downside is - my trajectory won't be astronomical the way it is for PE or IB VPs, but it'll be good for just steady state quality of life improvements over time. My boss who was formerly in banking (probably 10 years older than me) is making about 350k-400k (significant portion in equity compensation) and he's working probably closer 40-60 hours with a family. Not a guarantee I'll get there, but nice to see where potential room for moving up

Compared to someone in banking of course, that's not that impressive. Someone with 10+ years could be a director or MD making millions. But hey, I probably would've never lasted that long if I stayed anyways

 

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