Someone at GS just said that they see GS/JP as the top two and then MS, which surprised me. Curious to hear others thoughts. Assume M&A role as opposed to financing, assess based on exit opps / culture / dealflow / overall experience as a junior
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If you're counting grains of sand, then yes. JPMorgan has a strong blue-blooded legacy in the City through Cazenove. GS has stood at the top of the European league tables for a decade.
Exits are absolutely undifferentiable. Even the shops that some term "GS only" (CD&R) can't nearly fill their hiring requirements with only 2 banks. Dealflow will depend on team. For UK M&A, MS is well below GS and JPM, and below the likes of Barclays, Rothschild, and BAML. MS performs better in, for instance, Italy and the Nordics.
"Culture" isn't nearly as homogenous for a big, international bank.
MS will pay you more than GS and JPM. Probably the most of any BB.
Generally true but CD&R has never been „GS only“ lol
Funds could easily fill their associates classes with a single bank. They don’t because it’s stupid. There are maybe 50-75 associate spots in large cap each year and not all of them are for bankers
which has the best Natrest team? By best i mean culture wise
In NR at GS. I think the people here are way more chill than in other groups. Obviously will still be very long hours no matter group at GS. Did some deals with Citi and the people there definitely don't come across as nice or chill. Can't comment on other banks.
Not NR, but have worked with Citi’s P&U / Infra teams - damn those guys are sweaty and difficult. Extremely hierarchical.
JPM by far. Stronger in renewables, energy, mining and energy transition. MS and GS are just “good” in NatRes. I work in another NatRes team and see JPM on a lot more stuff.
Sorry, re-read your post. Culture wise I can’t speak from JPM or GS but I’ve heard MS is tough.
In tech would definitely say MS > JPM
GS the best overall
I would think it’s more group dependent
MS is brutal.....
Can confirm. Have a lot of friends who are / used to be at MS. They all say culture and hours is absolute trash.
Yep friends there have mentioned the media&comms and the power & utilities team to be especially bad
what about uk coverage team?
Anyone got any insight on the Quant/Trading side in terms of work environment?
From my experience quant is typically a bit more relaxed than IB, but not sure what the hours/ culture are like at GS/MS/JPM.
Also not sure where the best gig is for each area like Equities, Rates, Comms, FX, etc.. would be interested to see how they stack up against each other.
All great places to work, provided you don’t really care about making money and enjoy a certain degree of genteel poverty
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