Toronto IB Tier List
Hey everyone,
I put together a rough Toronto IB tier list based mainly on pedigree and buy-side exits, but I am sure there are some gaps and misrankings here.
Would really appreciate it if anyone with a better sense of the market could clarify, correct, or comment on this list:
S++: Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley
S: Bank of America, Barclays, Jefferies, Greenhill
S-: Citi, Rothschild, UBS, Wells Fargo, RBC
A+: TD, BMO
A-: CIBC, Scotiabank
B+: National Bank
B: Canaccord Genuity, Raymond James, Stifel
B-: Desjardins, ATB Financial, INFOR Financial
C+: Agentis
Also, if I am missing any relevant Toronto offices or firms that should be included, please let me know.
del
I just checked LinkedIn and saw that Wells Fargo does have an investment banking team. Do you know how large their Toronto office is and how strong their presence is within Toronto IB?
Small team (2 MDs i believe) and they do cross border M&A rather than domestic
del
All you have to know:
S Tier: Agentis
what is the reputation they have?
Was a joke bro
CIBC Mining #1 in mental heath issues
Debatable, but hands down number 1 for strip club visits
Missing Desjardins Capital Markets
They are recreational bankers
INFOR
Big 4 audit guys posing as bankers. Relationship managers are mostly retired guns
lol couldn’t be a more true statement
Addis Ababa banking tierlist next?
Emphasis on the global banks is overstated. Lots of really strong Canadian bank groups with strong deal flow
National Bank is better than CG. Stifel better than ATB. UBS should be same tier as Rothschild in Canada
roths >> ubs, they do some international mining coverage and bespoke rx/specialty mining stuff out of TO.
Debatable. UBS sold Bombardier Transport to Alstom and did the Garda-HPS led LBO to name a few assignments.
Left Lane Associates S+++
Realistically Roths should be S-, most people would take that over Big 5, WF should be A/A+ - team is very small and growing still, they only have relevance because of global branding
Can you even name more than 5 deals that came out of Wells Fargo TO in the past 3 years
Ranger oil & Baytex, Duke energy sale to Brookfield, California resources & Aera merger, Viterra & Bunge Merger, LKQ acquisition of Uni-Select, all domestic deals. Not bad for a small team
Lots of these rankings are focusing on prestige for some reason over actual deal flow/transaction volume & value within the country
I’m not very familiar with the Toronto IB landscape, so I was wondering whether deal flow matters more or firm prestige / brand name.
It seems like the Canadian banks often have stronger deal flow, while the global banks are sometimes ranked higher mainly because of their reputation.
Would you be able to point out which parts of my tier list you think should be changed?
congrats on wells fargo
I’d say it’s accurate, if you asked around I would say 9 out of 10 ppl would take WF over any Big 5 except RBC M&A
This is based on my own personal experience, seeing which banks people would choose over another. Reason for the indexing toward globals is that most people I know are targeting PE recruitment or a US internal transfer.
LLA (Left Lane Associates) > GS/MS > JPM/EVR > BAML / Barclays / Jeff / GHL > Citi / Roth / UBS / WF / RBC M&A > BMO M&A / TD M&A / BMO M&M / TD CMT / Other standout Big 6 groups / Non-Toronto Globals in Canada > Other Big 6 M&A Teams > Rest of Big 6 > Non-Toronto Big 6 in Canada / CG / RJ / Stifel > Desjardins > Big 6 DCM > Big 6 ECM > Boutiques > Agentis (Churn Factory)
Word on the street is that the entire LLA team may be integrating into PJT NYC next year. Paul J. Taubman (PJT) is heavily considering going ALL IN on the Canadian supply chain industry, creating PJT & LLA Partners.
.
I've never heard of LLA. Are you trolling or is this an actual thing?
Bro google LLA haha
Top Canadian firm leading the upcoming SpaceX IPO
This list is mostly accurate for exits, but RBC should probably be higher up next to the US BBs for the Toronto market specifically. They dominate the deal flow here. I’d move Wells Fargo down a bit too since their presence isn't as established as BMO or TD in Canada.
Would put JPM and EVR same tier as GS/MS at least. Will get the same buyside looks across all 4 TO offices, but fewer spots at JPM/EVR/GS vs MS (1-2 vs 4 each year)
JPM and Evercore are way too high. Can someone point to any notable deals or exits either office has done or executed? Their US platforms are strong, but the cdn branches are really immaterial
Citi is also non existent in Toronto
JPM's only now starting to build out its Cdn office and believe they are on the Roots mandate. EVR was just on the EddyFi deal. Regardless, can realistically exit anywhere coming from these offices but hard to give up USD pay in TO
Evercore did not do eddify deal and roots deal is a sub cad 200 deal…although evercore pay is nuts
So you proved my point - JPM is way too high and shouldn’t be ranked until they have a track record. Roots is a strategic review for a $100mm unaffected market cap company and is a tough mandate as the company is barely saleable. Prob a favour from the sponsors group to searchlight capital
Evercore Toronto did not work on the ESAB deal. It was done out of the industrials team in NY. Toronto’s SMD is an ex RBC Calgary energy coverage guy who tried to pivot into diversified coverage
i’d take rbc, td, bmo m&a over jpm, wf, ubs (either not very active like ubs who has barely dony any work post 2023, or jpm which is new, wf is mostly lending relationships/corp banking where they’ve done some interesting lead left, if you have access to the recruitment deck they shared for summer analyst class through a club)
Pay is better at global banks tho but agreed that those offices don’t do much. Whale (for Canadian standards) hunting model - where they need 1 big deal every 2 years and the office pays for itself.
That sounds incredible?
Better international prestige / buy-side exits, USD pay in CAD, supposedly less work (though GS also does the "whale hunting" model and GS TO is a sweatshop).
Congrats on agentis
Grades go to F so why start at S++?
Evercore though small I think is on par with GS / MS. The brand is as good and pay would be top notch.
Agentis while a sweatshop I do think has good exits, people go to top tier banks from there (though pipelines to better banks are hardly exits).
S: Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley
A+: Greenhill, Barclays
A: Evercore, Jefferies, RBC M&A, Rothschild
A-: Bank of America, BMO M&A, BMO DIG (m&m arguable for dealflow but exits are equal to or better at BMO DIG and m&a), TD M&A, TD CMT, RBC DIG, RBC FIG, RBC Tech, CIBC EIT
B: Other groups at RBC, BMO, TD, CIBC. All groups at Scotia (obv M&A and Mining and scotia are better for dealflow), good groups at National, Wells Fargo (mainly levfin/financing)
C: Other National groups, CG, Infor, Fort, Agentis, Raymond James
D: Origin Merchant, Stifel, Desjardins, ATB Cormark (idk about desjardins and atb too much)
notes:
No way Greenhill is that high and especially now that BMO poached 2 of their MDs
congrats on rejection email from wf, and bofa
thanks for the value add comment. going to west coast ib fyi
No JPM?
What is CMT?
holy wow congrats on greenhill, and rothschild is not in the same tier as EVR or JEF
You’re overweighting some of the globals just because of the brand name. A 5 person Toronto team made of 3 seniors, a vp, and an associate, is not better than RBC/TD/BMO
It is for exits which is what these tier lists are all about.
As others have mentioned, Agentis is a brutal churn factory however they have seen a lot of laterals into other big 5 infra groups and exits into infra arms of the pensions, which you can’t really say for most of these other no name / shit tier banks
Arpit Nigam
D: RBC Mining
Apart from Hugh Samson and Scott Redwood, who else is terrible to work with?
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