I'm a 2nd year Investment Banking (M&A) analyst in London looking to fulfill my lifelong dream of moving and working in the US. I've been trying the recruiter route for over a month so far but without US citizenship / a green card I haven't been able to even get a chance to interview. Recruiter feedback has been to do a masters and go the STEM OPT route.
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Since OPT has to be directly related to the major studied and finance isn't STEM, what majors did international students in the US who work in banking study? The US gov. considers "Management Science" to be STEM - is this the major to go for? I studied Business for undergrad, so don't have any advanced or technical academic knowledge.
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What are the top or "target" universities to apply for? I assume prestige would be the most important factor to look for as recruiters would flock to those institutions for on-campus recruiting which is presumably how I would land a job
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Should I recruit for IB? It makes sense because it's my job now but with the regular firing that takes place in IB I don't want to risk being fired during OPT due to a bad market after just paying $$$ for a masters and losing my shot and life in the US altogether
Thank you everyone very much in advance for your help - much appreciated!
Easiest route would be to recruit for a big bank in London then try to transfer to the US via internal mobility schemes.
top targets for IB would be the M7 schools besides H/S who, while will place very well in IB, generally have students who don’t bother. Other solid MBA programs would be at places like Dartmouth, Duke, NYU, UMich, UVA, UTA, UNC, and probably a few more I’m missing
Thank you! What did you mean by H/S?
Harvard and Stanford
Most US banks give you an option to transfer as long as you are highly rated.
1) Internal transfer within your own company should be the easiest way, if you know how to leverage your network and the contacts you have. The initial, relevant visa avenues should be L for the transfer, E1/E2 for either personal investment or corporate transfer (depends on details like how the company is structured, nationality of the company, etc), F visa for students if you want to go for a degree, H1b for transfer or post F, E3 if you hold Australian citizenship, O if you have extraordinary skills. J should no longer apply to professionals (J could apply post degree though!)
2) Further education and then walk through OPT, H1b, GC, citizenship. Be aware that H1b is more difficult to get these days.
3) Date/marry someone in the US. This makes even more sense if you come from a community where people prefer partners from their own culture. Doesn't have to be arranged, but there is a reason why so many niche dating apps and portals exist. You may have a preference that your spouse has a certain cultural, religious or linguistic background.
4) Family sponsorship is also possible and a straight-forward route, normally. Your first degree family members can sponsor you (i.e. parents, children, siblings)
5) Investment based green card; possible if the amount of investment exceeds a certain amount (1.8M/900K)
6) Diversity lottery, if your nationality allows to participate.
As you can see, there are various avenues into a new country and many options are available. Simply applying to a job in the US and hoping to land a visa sponsorship is indeed a possibility, but I wouldn't bet my career or life on it. Also, participate in the the diversity lottery if your nationality allows it - low chance of winning, but you never know!
The most likely scenarios are internal transfer or study in the US. If you study in the US, be aware that it is more difficult to get the H1b these days.
Also look into:
Cap-exempt H1b roles (research, non-profit, academics, charity, religious employers, ..)
If you do decide to study in the US, make sure that the low H1b odds will be offset by the quality of the institution/degree. Since you will be paying international tuition (highest amount), it makes almost no sense to attend an average school as even they are pricey for international students. There is no point in moving, paying, studying and living a more difficult life just so you won't get placed afterwards. Ask for the international student grad/placement data for the schools you are looking at.
Chat GPT is that you?
No, it's me.
Part of my job is to migrate startup teams to the US and I work with immigration attorneys all the time.
I am not lawyer though, and the information up there has not been verified.
Feel free to check my post history re: immigration topics.
Thank you so much this is very detailed and helpful - much appreciated!
Is there really no way to find a job in IB in the US without transferring internally or being married to someone there? Seems strange to me that banks in NYC would not hire someone with a great academic background and 1-2 yrs of relevant experience in IB. Doesn’t seem too easy to find someone with that background..
Professional job holders often assume (wrongly) that they are special, there is an abundance of unemployed or underemployed people in almost any market. This goes for the UK, CA, US, .. - so yeah, it is very easy to find someone like that locally.
1-2 years is not a lot of experience
"great academic background" - might be the case, but these are foreign credentials, an alien (non citizen)
Employers are about minimizing risk. If you hire someone from another culture (EU/Asian/African/... culture is very different from US culture), and with foreign credentials, you are taking on a huge amount of risk. Hiring processes are expensive and hiring the wrong person is even more expensive. In some cases it's even a liability.
And before someone says this is unfair, the same goes for a US citizen in the EU (or other market). They don't get preferential treatment either.
It is common to hire local people first in almost every market, as it creates less work/effort and makes more sense. An employer also has a responsibility towards their own country.
I will not condone anything illegal - but why do you think so many people jump over a fence or come in dinghy boats to other nations? They know it will be next to impossible to do it the legal way. There are so many people who get a student visa or visitor visa and then... just never leave.
So, the only other way would be that way. And that won't help anyone in a professional job anyway due to eVerify and more.
(to be fair, the items I posted above do no resemble a complete list, but the other routes are even less likely, i.e. religious/missionary work, being an important witness for the government, being a refugee or asylum seeker, and so many more - those options have nothing to do with people on WSO)
Unfortunately the state of the US immigration system makes it extremely difficult for foreign nationals to work in the US. Personally I’m trying to get out of the US into London given how much of a hassle it is….
Easiest way would be to work for a BB in London and move internally after a couple of years.
Most places would facilitate it as long as you have a decent rep.
Would not recommend you doing a Masters given you are already in IB.
As someone mentioned above, you should try to join a US bank, work for 4-5 years there ensuring you are a top performer in your group every year and then you will be in a good position to ask for a transfer.
Visa sponsorship ain’t cheap, your bank will only send you to the US once you prove that you are loyal to the company and you have gained a good reputation.
Actually visa sponsorship is cheap.. a few thousand dollars at max! Performance factor aside, it's also a question of demand-supply.Some one in my group transferred all the way from Australia in 2021 cause they cudn find Analysts fast enough here in the US (believe it or not!)So gotto to time it well, just staying 4-5 years for this sake is dumb
Australian citizens may qualify for E3, which is non-immigrant, open to many "specialist occupation" roles, and cap-exempt. Maybe they got that or a different visa, but it is absolutely easier if you hold AU citizenship.
Thank you very much all - I actually already work for a large US bank in London and have been pushing for the internal transfer for several months now. The pushback hasn't been due to the $$$ of the visa but that when they advertise open positions, they want an Analyst who will be able to fill the role immediately, which will never be me because it will take 6+ months for my visa to process. I brought up the idea of giving me a start date several months / 1 year in advance based on anticipated headcount needs but the response has been that although some projections are made regarding future headcount, they wouldn't issue an offer several months in advance. They have also said it won't be easy because the bank will have to prove to the US government that there was no US Analyst available to fill the position and therefore they had to look internationally.
My Development Officer suggested to think outside of Corporate and Investment Banking and e-mail my CV to every Development Officer across the bank and see who is interested and take what I can get but it feels degrading.
These are "common reasons'' employers mention, but I don't know how true they are. You are an already trained analyst who could, in theory, start immediately from a different office location. For a permanent headcount it should be fairly reasonable to wait a few months. The L visa adjudication time can be anywhere from eight weeks to a couple months, so even six months is stretching it (large companies can usually file a "L visa blanket petition" to accelerate the process)
But there needs to be an approval for moving the headcount, back fill, the contractual side, comp discussions, insurances, etc - but none of this should be that much of a hurdle for a large corporation. I understand how corporations may be slower at times.
I actually think the MBA route should work well for you - given you already have IB experience.
To answer your question, most MBA programs have a finance concentration that’s considered STEM - colleges have found ways around the designation to continue to attract international students.
I have seen multiple people transfer internally across the pond so maybe they are just disguising market conditions as “it’ll take too long”. What about staying within the same group as well? Say you work TMT IB in London and see if you can go to the TMT team in US?
I don’t think the MBA route works here either. 99% of European Investment Bankers that do an MBA in the US end up doing the Associate program in London / European offices, even after they did their SA in NY. A bank is not an NGO, they will not sponsor you a visa when they can get a much cheaper American alternative. Also you need to consider that is not in the best interest of the Bank to go to a client with foreign bankers, Banking is still a very local-focused business, and I don’t see CEOs of Fortune 500 companies going with a German or Belgian Director when they have hundreds of American alternatives from other banks. Cultural fit is key when it comes to sell or buy a business, and Americans will trust other Americans for that.
Your best chance to work in banking in the US is from a European Bank rather than from a US Bulge Bracket. I know places like SocGen, BNP, HSBC or Deutsche that have a lot of European staff in NY, this is because they work as a link between European clients and US investors.
This is such a bad and outdated take.
The cost of a sponsorship is negligible for any bank and if a bank hires you to do an internship in NY then you’ll get a return for the same office. The bank doesn’t differentiate pay based on nationalities either so a 10k cost of sponsorship is negligible on a 300k total comp. and more likely than not the international person will stay at the bank much longer so the ROI is higher.
Also, it’s weird you say local businesses and then proceed to mention CEOs of Fortune 500 companies since those aren’t your small country businesses and in fact many of those have executives that themselves were born outside US. Plus, OP will come in with tier 1/2 IB experience which will give him a big leg up on others in his MBA program - even Americans.
You do know that the language of communication in UK is English, right? Lmao.
From what I understand, and what recruiters have told me, I need to be a US student to do the OPT to have work authorization. That can be achieved by doing a masters, not only an MBA. Because the MBA is SIGNIFICANTLY more expensive and I have been in the workforce for only just over 1 year, then wouldn't a masters be a much more strategic route? Also, if *knock on wood* the masters were to not work out, then I could fall back on an MBA in the future, whereas if I went for the MBA right away then what else would I have to fall back on?
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