Has anyone made the move from project finance at a Canadian/Japanese/French bank or a BB (focusing on infra, power/renewables, energy deals ect) to an infra or energy coverage team or M&A team? How hard would it be to make such a move given ~1yr of project finance experience at the analyst level straight out of undergrad? Or even from a project finance team to a leveraged finance team?
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I haven't made the move personally but I networked with a guy who did a year of PF at a French bank and then moved to a P&U coverage group at a Japanese IB.
Your best bets are the P&U groups. I don't think you'll be lateralling to Goldman Sachs but look into Jefferies/TD/Scotia P&U groups.
Thanks for the insights. Roughly how long was this person in PF before lateraling?
Just curious, why would you want to move from PF to M&A? PF is far more interesting work imo.
More curious than anything, whether it’s a possibility/has been done before. Are you currently in PF?
Yes I am. Great segment
Yes I am. Great segment
Hi mate, any chance you can shoot me a personal message ? Have a few questions about project finance and would love to get your input
I made this move on a similar timeline to a coverage team. Just pushed the modelling side hard which is a real asset in PUI/Energy coverage. You should also focus on the fact you have/want an equity/owners mindset and not a debt one (or at least, recognise the longer you stay on the debt side the harder it will be to move to a coverage role). I ended up with a few offers at MM's in PUI coverage, and then made the move to BB about 5 years later.
Thanks for the insights. Do you mind if I ask if you came from PF at a Japanese/French bank, or a BB? Also apart from modelling skills, what else do PU&I coverage teams value?
Also, what was your split between financing and advisory like during your time in PF?
Not a BB but one of the major European structured finance banks.
I only did advisory and i would recommend you focus more on this as opposed to lending (to the extent you have a choice), as the skillset is different and more transferable. Easier to sell yourself as an advisory banker which has parallels to coverage since some clients in the PF world only deal with PF teams and not the coverage (M&A) team. Then you can say you have a quasi-coverage role too.
Then aside from modelling and the above, just have some commercial nouse and understand what is going on in the sector and who is doing what, who is buying and selling and strategies etc (you can get this from reading equity research reports for example). This will basically show (again) that even though you work in a debt team, you are not a just a debt guy and you have all of these great transferrable technical skills, are able to speak to clients in an advisory capacity, are commercial and have a real interest in the sector.
The good thing is that the PUI space is so hot with so much dry powder across all kinds of funds that there is a real churn of talent from banks to buyside, which means there are always a lot of roles open for A&As in coverage teams, provided candidates can demonstrate they have the ability to move from having a debt perspective to an equity one.
Hope that is helpful.
I’m currently in a Nordic bank doing project finance on the lending side and have gotten (unsolicited) offers from recruiters to interview for IBD/M&A roles, including in London. Granted, those were with boutiques, not any BBs. I think the main reason why I got their attention was because there is a lack of people with experience in renewables which is what I work with. This would suggest to me that the move is possible (though I declined to interview for London so don’t know how that would’ve gone).
I'm assuming these interview offers were for P&U or similar coverage?
Yes, all in renewables
Project finance to energy/infra IB won't be a difficult switch - you cover one of the only sectors with similar assets, and the modeling is not tht different. M&A team (not energy-specific, just product team) will be quite difficult as that is typically the most sought-after group.
What would you say are they most valued transferable skills to make this switch?
Industry knowledge (even if you are only working on asset financing, knowing lingo, players, and what's going on is huge)
Also being able to talk about your modeling skills in a way that convinces them you can do energy modeling. Note the "talk about" - almost no bank will do a model test, so you should have a very clear script you're following about deals/technical experience that appeals to coverage groups
I started as an analyst in PF and then lateraled to a BB coverage group. I got a few offers during the lateral process including for M&A and non-infrastructure coverage groups. Now at an MF.
Definitely don't limit yourself, you hopefully have a strong modeling foundation and in-depth understanding of one of the most complicated industries. Should be able to sell yourself into any banking seat imo.
Thanks for the insights. May I ask from what sort of PF team were you able to lateral to a BB? Did you find the overall process difficult i.e getting pinged against others with previous IB experience or the PF skill set was regarded highly in a P&U/energy/infra coverage seat?
I was at a bank that was not competitive on lending (i.e. not a French / Japanese bank) but was more focused on structuring / bonds / acquisition finance. If you're in the space you'll know what I mean but I don't want to dox myself.
I found if your interviewer has any understanding of what PF is, they will respect your experience and again especially the technical / modeling skill-set. Where they will focus on is your understanding of the M&A process and how to think about equity, which you don't do as much in PF. Hopefully you can get some M&A-related reps (staple structuring or LBO finance) to talk to, especially for platforms rather than assets, but if not you'll just have to do a lot of reading and talk with some buddies in coverage groups.
Hopefully you're in a seat that doesn't just do greenfield project lending but grants you exposure to the whole breadth of infrastructure across digital (TMT), energy, power, transportation (industrials), etc. Granted if your interviewer has done eg. consumer software deals her whole life, she might find it hard to understand how your experience is relatable, but you could for example parlay the surprising similarities of a fiber-to-the-home financing (B2C model, unit economics [churn / LTV], capex = CAC, etc.) to the space she's more familiar with.
In a v similar position and also at non lending heavy BB, wondering if the MF was infra/energy focused or corp PE? Curious what the process was like?
Thanks
Sorry just saw this. I'm doing infra at the MF, but we exclusively do platform acquisitions so it's as corporate PE as you can get in infra. During PE recruiting i got quite deep in a few generalist processes (and even some growth) but ended up going with MF Infra for brand recognition.
Pretty common move especially at the junior level (I’ve done it once upon a time) because you have some industry experience and also modelling so that’s all that’s really needed of you. When the market is hot, it becomes easier to move into a non energy/infra teams as well but you do have to do more homework since the interviewer won’t be all that interested in your industry specific experience.
You can definitely do it. You are one year in and have some experience. Make it clear that you have the ability to learn and don’t anticipate that you will have issues picking up a new area. Stick with M&A though. Don’t get stuck with only energy-related experience. No one cares about it and you will have a hard time lateraling out of it.
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