HW vs Lower-Tier BB

UBS/DB absolutely clear HW. IK DB leauge tables are bad and "hurr hurr, no deal flow", they still get treated like a BB by many headhunters and get way better looks from HHs compared to a known MM player like HW. Also, DB is still higher than HW anyway in the league table. UBS same applies just better than DB still. WF/RBC is more debatable since they aren't traditionally considered BB's and still classified within the MM world by many (because people basically classify all non-EB/BB firms the same for some reason in the industry).

Also not sure what uptick you are talking about at least relative to those firms. I think UBS straight-up hired more MDs this past year than any other bank and almost doubled their MD count, and WF also got a lot of notable names this year. Idt HW got anyone nearly as notable as multiple Barclays & CS groups heads (UBS) or some senior CS MDs including those from their best group in Sponsors (WF), RBC is also always poaching MDs little from little from the BBs. Even DB has hired more MDs from other BBs with a lot coming from the mid-tier BBs and some even from the big 3 ones. I think you can argue any of those firms I mentioned are on more of an uptick and I think it'd be nearly impossible to argue otherwise for RBC (basically steadily growing in market share every year in the Americas for the past decade), UBS (insane and unprecedented levels of hirings in terms of recent memory), and WF (got a lot of rainmakers and finally focusing on IB with their huge ass balance sheet).