How does working at an investment bank compare between working at a place like RBC Capital Markets and some local mid-market boutique firm that does deals for companies with $5-20MM in EBITDA?
Is there any prestige or “feel good about your job” factor when you’re working at a boutique investment bank instead of JP Morgan?
Do you do the same things day-to-day? Are the things you learn about Financial Modeling and the Deal Process the same across both sides?
Personal question:
For a 23 year old Mid-market commercial banker (Canada), would it make sense to try to break into Mid-market investment banking/Mid-market leveraged finance ? What are the merits? Is it a worthwhile mission in your opinion if you are in my shoes? Should I just stay and make a career out of commercial banking and focus on building my own entrepreneurial business venture on the side?
bump.
Hahaha. Bro, there's never any "feel good about your job" feeling regardless of the size of the bank where you work. As soon as you start feeling cool about the WSJ front-page transaction you created a model for, you quickly remember the CIM that needs to be completed by tomorrow, the #REF error you need to fix in your intern's model, and the five messages from various VPs on your phone.
I assume by "boutique" you mean a tiny shop with maybe five bankers, not Moelis, Evercore, etc. I spent my first year of IB at "no-name" boutique. I lateraled as a second-year analyst to a top MM firm. I then left IB for corp dev. The work you do at a "no-name" boutique is the exact same as at a MM, just on a smaller scale. I would say the work is actually more time-intensive because you have no print shop, no interns, etc. You also have to hold your client's hand throughout the entire M&A process because while the client might be an expert in their industry, they know nothing about finance and couldn't tell you the difference between EBITDA and a corn dog. The M&A process is the same, it's just the minutia that is slightly different.
Wow.
Thank you for providing such a detailed response - that was really helpful.
Any chance you would be willing to expand a little more on your answer by sharing your opinion on my personal question?
It's hard to answer your question as I have no experience in commercial banking. If IB is where you want to be, why not? Worst case scenario, you hate it and go back to commercial banking.
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