Truist Financial (BB&T/SunTrust merger) Salary expectations

Can speak to some knowledge on this. CB pay can vary widely depending if the CB sits with IB or commercial banking within the bank. You're in luck here as STRH (now Truist) lumps the Corporate & Investment bank together like lots of big balance sheet banks do and pays CB analysts similarly to IB analysts. You can expect something like the following:

A1 - $80K base, $25K bonus, $12K signing A2 - $85K base, $35K bonus A3 - $90K base, $45K bonsus

Obviously the bonus can vary depending on performance of the group/bank and your year end ranking. The only difference between the IB and CB at the junior level is the bonus, as IB analysts will get slightly more (say for A1 more like $35-$40K). Overall pay is pretty close street/a little less.

Now the attractive part about CB at Truist is that you get you IB like pay (albeit not as much) but much better hours. On avg. I would think like 60 hours (45-55 when light, 70-80 when heavy). I would say something like 9-7/8 with just a little work over the weekend (answering emails or quick updates). If you're interested in CB long-term I think it's an interesting option because as an associate you can make like $200K+ while working 50 hours a week and living in a state with lower cost of living and lower taxes than NY.

However, if you're interested in exits similar to IB than this is a no go. You're just not going to get looks. I would say most people that want to do PE and are in CB end up lateraling to the IB of another bank to get sell-side experience, but the downside of that is you'll probably have to reset to an A1 all over again. (it's not impossible to go straight to PE but definitely not the norm). I would say most people tend to exit either to work CF with a client, bus dev with a client, lateral to another bank or a lot of people just stay and do the associate promote and I feel like STRH has a lot higher retention from analysts staying for the associate promote than other banks (I feel like this comes from a combo of analysts not wanting to leave and analysts not really having great opportunities if they do want to leave). Overall people at STRH tend be fine with making a career at STRH

Culture wise Truist will be better than most banks. Southern culture, more collegial atmosphere, and bankers tend to understand and appreciate your time. Of course this will depend on which city you're in and your group but for overall culture is good and there's always bankers that are a-holes/will make your life more difficult at any bank/group but these types are not the norm at Truist and sr. bankers won't last long if they can't play nice with others at Truist.

The growth of the platform will be interesting to see with the combined banks. Not sure anyone could tell you with certainty although it seems like they'll try to use the combine balance sheets and leverage that into larger credit commitments and more Right/Left Leads on loans and CM activity (with a long-term goal I'm guessing of using the financing capabilities to win M&A mandates but to see any traction/market share gains will take a long time there). Legacy SunTrust tried to market STRH as a full-service Corporate & Investment Bank but at the end of the day the image of STRH as a lender is stuck in most people's minds. STRH was built on the DCM platform post the 2008 recession and is the bread and butter of the bank. The ECM platform is newer and STRH has been trying to grow that but that takes time. In terms of M&A those deals are few and far between for the investment bank, and a large part of the role in the IBank is similar to CB (lending & CM activity) since STRH isn't that relevant of a MM M&A player. They try to use the balance sheet and lend to these MM companies but I just don't think sponsors look at them as a serious M&A advisor and get passed on for other MM focused shops. IMO there's a large disconnect to where sr. mgmt thinks the platform is and where they actually compete in the market. Legacy BB&T was much stronger on the retail banking side of things and the Corporate & Investment Bank there mainly just did small capital commitments to bank deals and took bond tips when they could so the combined firm should be following more of the legacy STRH platform/capabilities/strategy. Sorry for the tangent but speaking to more of the banks broader CIB platforms not just CB.

Also, STRH (Truist) makes it analysts spend a large chunk of their time doing internal work/projects, part of which is due to the risk culture of the bank so you're constantly doing internal memos and other work for approval purposes on deals and part of it is I would say that the bank is kinda cheap (always talks about its efficiency ratio) and doesn't really invest in things that would make analysts life easier. This can be frustrating when you're working late for some internal project that's not for a client and doesn't really matter but someone has to do it.

Overall I would say it's a good opportunity to get an understanding of debt/capital structure/financing with good pay/hours. If you're expecting to do the normal 2-years then exit to buyside I would manage your expectations as that's unlikely but a good place to work long-term if interested in staying in finance, receiving good pay, with lower hours than most banks