81 Comments
 

Citi comp day was very good. Same as last year.

For everyone that made fun of Citi on this forum the past couple years, we still paid top of street BB wise.

 

MS numbers are an absolute trainwreck.

MS will lose lots of their staff to this and rightly so.

The mood music is dreadful.

 
44_Patel

MS numbers are an absolute trainwreck.

MS will lose lots of their staff to this and rightly so.

The mood music is dreadful.

What were you expecting, deal flow down by 50 percent. No one is leaving 

 

wwert134

44_Patel

MS numbers are an absolute trainwreck.

MS will lose lots of their staff to this and rightly so.

The mood music is dreadful.

What were you expecting, deal flow down by 50 percent. No one is leaving 

I don’t get the “deal flow is down” argument. Junior bankers don’t get comp’d based on deal flow like senior bankers do. Hence why Junior banker comp is supposed to be less variable YoY. If business is down, this should be a MD/D problem. Am I missing something?

 

Isn't MS the leanest headcount of the BBs (100 An1)? How do they comp so low when their annual fees per head are boutique tier?

 

Yup, I don't know how.

They pay Seniors very well to keep top performers. That's where the majority goes.

Rest is pocketed by the bank. 

MS has always been a low payer vs the other US bulge brackets.

Sponsors M&A (London)
 

Isn't MS the leanest headcount of the BBs (100 An1)? How do they comp so low when their annual fees per head are boutique tier?

Once you IPO, the purpose of your business is to make your shareholders rich, not your employees. If Morgan Stanley has a record year T Rowe Price, Vanguard, etc. want a record dividend. They aren't going to just let you crank OpEx up by paying your employees above market, at the expense of Operating CF that could be paying dividends or reinvesting in revenue opportunities.  

That's why EBs are so money. I mean real EBs; Ducera, Qatalyst, FT Partners all pay the absolute Christ out of their employees in good years. And nobody can tell them not to: the employees own the business. 

Lazard, Moelis & Evercore aren't even really "boutiques" to me anymore. At this point they're all public companies worth a few billion that exist as a cash generation machine to pay dividends to shareholders. They're still able to pay employees slightly above market, but can no longer give the type of windfalls that guys at Qatalyst/Ducera can get during a blockbuster year. 

 

No idea on this guys situation but my group gave out a few zeros pre-COVID and hear we are getting back to that, its not usually a big suprise who gets it. From a firm perspective, its a good way to get people to leave without the PR headache of formally firing people. You can technically stay but most won't / they'll make it inhospitable for you, 0 bonus, bad staffings, hell, even a bad seat on the floor.

 
curious_underwriter

The bonuses were a train-wreck. The argument of this being a bad year is not really fair. Last year even though was a record year, bonuses were pretty normal at junior levels and MDs / EDs pocketed large chunks. The cuts however this year have been loaded onto Analysts / Associates too ! 

MD and EDs hold the relationships. When market comes back, you can always hire A&As quickly / grind your existing juniors, but hiring people with relationships has a very long lead time in comparison. Senior comp is also more variable so you can turn it down more on a percentage basis. It’s fucked up but it makes sense to pursue this strategy.

 

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