Does the lateral job market for analysts heat up at all in January? I've been surprised by how dead it is these past few weeks...definitely anticipated more opportunities to make moves out there. More specifically wondering about banks looking for 1st year analyst with around 6 months experience.
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Typically, laterals are expected to have around 9-12 months experience to make a good enough case to lateral; otherwise, the other firm won't think you've spent enough time with your current firm and might think you'll jump from their firm too as soon as the next best thing comes their way.
If you think you have a good argument even then, then you've got to constantly be Googling lateral positions or setting up notifications on job aggregators like LinkedIn or Indeed. The other important thing is that you need to create positions for yourself and actively seek out such positions. Specifically, reach out to friends or cold email other banks to see if there's an opening. There are several banks/offices across the nation that are actively hiring but aren't posting anywhere about this. These banks would be very open to taking on lateral analysts if they were reached out to. For example, I know of a BB whose NY and SF offices are growing rapidly and open to laterals at both the analyst and associate levels but are not posting about these positions. If you're actually serious about lateraling, then you will reach out even through cold emails or look constantly online for postings. Don't just wait on this site for people to tell you what to do (though I appreciate you asking the question and potentially getting some tips like the ones I just provided you).
would you share the name of the bank mentioned above?
Hey I appreciate the slight kick in the ass. I actually got this job and my last internship through cold emailing.
I'm also pretty hesitant to lateral this early because I know that a 6-7 month stint will be a black mark on my resume for a while. It's just that my current group is so god damn dysfunctional I don't see anyway we close any deals by next July. I fear that if I have zero closed deals, combined with the fact that I'm currently at a "no-name" boutique, may prevent me from lateraling to a better bank next summer. What are your thoughts on me just waiting it out until next June even if I have zero closed deals?
Just focus on getting some great resume bullets around the quantitative and qualitative skills so you can talk well about them to show you know your stuff and can contribute to the hiring firm. Having no deal is fine but we'd all honestly take a guy with no closed deals who worked on a complex cohort analysis and led the CIM creation compared to another with two closed deals who can't remember what EBITDA stands for.
Where is this boutique located? Is it in a big city?
In my opinion the Lateral market for analysts and associates has been quite dead over the past 3-4 months. More than usual for this time of year.
Aside from the seasonality issue anyone else notice this too?
Yea same here. I was in the process for one position but even that dragged along for quite some time. In other cases I've seen the same few positions being advertised for a while and when speaking to the bankers on the inside, they've said they arent in a rush to fill them. I want to say that its a combination of not enough people leaving their positions as well as banks not deciding whether to fill those positions immediately given some uncertainty about whether business will pick up again. Its been a rough year I feel, we'll see how this shifts when bonuses come out.
Probably late cycle behavior by banks
Also, reach out to headhunters. Those people, I believe, know the open spots at banks for sure because they need to know this for a living.
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