HELP: MS GCM vs JPM Investment Management
Hi everyone,
I have been fortunate enough to receive summer internship offers form MS Global Capital Markets (ECM/DCM) and JPM Investment Management. It's for their US Equity Behavioral Finance Fund with around $20bn under management. For more detail please google "JP Morgan Behavioral Finance"
While I see myself in buyside (HF) in the future, and the work at JPM IM seems more fun to me, candidates I met at MS GCM superday have much more impressive background than candidates at JPM IM. MS GCM was dominated by top-tier target schools (Wharton, Columbia, etc.) whereas JPM IM candidates come from much more diverse background (still good schools, but largely outside of top 20 US News). I don't want to sound elitist, but I believe this is an important indicator of prestige and exit opportunities.
My offers are expiring soon and I need to decide in a few days. Would be very grateful for everyone's input.
No chance at getting into one of GCM's LevFin verticals?
Unfortunately LevFin is not an option for me
First of all, congratulations on your offers, both are great places to be. I think you should first examine what you want in a career first. I personally would go with J.P. Morgan. It is rare opportunity for an undergrad to directly go into the buyside and you'll have better learning opportunities due to a flatter hierarchy (less people). The Alma Mater of the people at the firm should not be your main consideration and for business school both firms are equal in terms of prestige.
However, if you value exit opportunities (HF or PE) you do not want to chose Capital Markets. MS GCM is a great division but having a career in ECM/DCM makes it extremely difficult (if not impossible) to move to the buyside in terms of PE/HF. You have to consider that HF/PE would rather take people from ER/IBD/Other Funds as they have more transactional, modelling, and industry specific experience. I have a few analyst friends who are in ECM/DCM at other top BBs (GS, JPM) and a common complaint that they have is that the work is very coverage heavy (i.e. less modelling intensive, more presentation and relationship based). Most people in Capital Markets are there for the long haul and you should consider MS GCM if you want to be a career Capital Markets banker. If the work at the J.P. Morgan fund is analytic at all, I argue it would be a better platform to jump to other funds since you are on the buyside already - or even other funds (equity/fixed income/alternative) managed by JPM AM.
Thanks a lot for your perspective Powa. I have heard that it is possible to move to credit HF from DCM as well. Is that quite rare?
What if I am also considering Consulting at MBB and/or Business Development at tech firms (Dropbox, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc.) for full-time? Would JPM IM still be preferable?
MS GCM will easily get you interviews at every bank for FT recruiting.
For a SA position I would take MS GCM pretty confidently over JP Investment Management- you will have the opportunity to do an accelerated MS IBD interview (assuming you do a good job over the summer) and as Will Hunting said, you will get interviews at any bank for FT. In the case that you do end up at FT MS GCM, very easy to switch into banking for a 3rd year (know a number of people who have done it) and many of those then end up going straight to business school. The most common exit from GCM is business/corp dev. - have had a number of people leave to go to work at Facebook and Google. Honestly even for FT I would probably go GCM- Investment Management at JP isn't going to have great buyside exits. Pros= hours will be much more manageable, though you will make a fair amount less money (bonus for IMD isn't usually very high). Both solid firms and solid offers- can't really go wrong either way.
I'd say MS GCM by a long shot. If you'd like to do banking full-time, it's the most applicable of the two.
Thanks a lot everyone for your input!
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