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JPM is currently winning in every major area besides exits (and even that is group dependent these days). If I wanted to be a career banker, I likely would’ve taken JPM, but I want to go buyside asap, so I took GS due to no group placement and in-house m&a. MS has lots of legacy prestige, but outside of a few groups, they’ve lost ground to JPM, as has everyone. Do think GS will pull back ahead though — brand there is exceptionally strong and prestige won’t be shifting for a while.

 

Sorry you didn’t get MS or GS. I’m sure you’re a strong candidate. My point is don’t confuse league tables and prestige. Harvard sometimes doesn’t make it to the top of the school list but it’s still Harvard. No one (unless they’re idiots) turns down Morgan Stanley or Goldman Sachs. This two firms are the top when it comes to the best MF placement and Harvard and Stanford acceptance… period!

 

Literally was in the situation you describe and know others in similar ones, so I have no real bias here. For people actually lucky enough to be making this choice, here is how you think about it: if you wanna exit asap or optimize your MBA placement, go to GS. If you wanna be a career banker and stay at one firm forever go to JPM — they really want that kind of person. Depending on groups/priorities MS vs JPM is a toss up. E.g. given your alumni, if you’re likely to place into lower tier MS coverage group in which you have no industry interest but you have good contacts at JPM m&a and you’re optimizing for PE exits then obviously you’re taking jpm.

For the record, i know multiple people (actually from the schools you mentioned as well as Princeton and Yale) who turned down GS/MS for various EBs or JPM depending on career goals. Not everyone wants to take the H/Y—>GS—>BX/KKR/APO—>HBS/GSB—>unfulfilled prestige whore pathway, and most of us who do fail somewhere along the way.

 

I think you'd be surprised by the number of people who turn down MS and GS for EB offers. just saying...

harvard has a roughly 80% yield on admissions offers that they give out. crazy to think you'd turn down harvard but hundreds of kids do each year

 

All I heard is students get JPM offers, the first thing they do is try to accelerate MS, and, if they get the MS offer, they accept on the spot. Never ever heard of this the other way around…

 

JPMorgan makes it a big deal to tout their “training program.” Morgan Stanley, on the other hand, cut theirs in half mainly because training programs are a complet waste of time. What you learn as an analyst is on the job, not from some schmuck teaching you about the 3 statements for a whole month. That’s why JPM will never make it above MS and GS!

 

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