Wells Fargo Top Groups (US)
With the recent changes at Wells I was wondering what people consider to be their strongest groups. By either product, industry, and city.
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Based on the most helpful WSO content, here’s a breakdown of Wells Fargo's strongest groups in the U.S. by product, industry, and city:
Top Groups by Product:
Top Groups by Industry:
Top Groups by City:
If you're prioritizing exit opportunities, REGAL (Real Estate, Gaming, and Lodging) is often highlighted as the best group for exits beyond lower-middle-market private equity or corporate development roles.
Sources: Wells Fargo Groups, A Warning on the Wells Fargo Securities Investment Banking Summer Analyst Program, A Warning on the Wells Fargo Securities Investment Banking Summer Analyst Program
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Historically REGAL and FIG have been strong due to their robust lending practices in the space creating more opportunities.
The past year or two IND, TMT, and HC have received heavy investment with mixed results. Still in the early innings but from what I hear, IND and HC are faring much better than TMT.
what about m&a?
How is their oil & gas group doing these days?
Very good albeit sweaty. But advised on some big name deals like Baker Hughes-Chart, and one of the co-advisors on SWN-CHK's combination into Expand
REGAL, FIG, LevFin, DCM, Energy. Avoid HC, C&R. TMT gaining and at least it’s a good sector to cover. M&A always good just for the skills you build. Financial Sponsors has been having trouble because of the slow LBO market, so not clear where they will shake out. They also have a pretty large group on the junior side, so won’t be enough good deals to go around when LBO activity picks up.
Why avoid HC and C&R?
From your experience, which is the most competitive group to get placed into as an intern? Also, why specifically avoid HC?
3/6 return offer rate, lowest besides ECM
3/6 return offer rate, low deal flow
Heard Wells is finally bumping corporate banking pay. Can anyone there confirm?
Who you hear this from
HR during an interview process. Supposedly will take effect Jan 1st.
Anyone know anything about C&R and Healthcare? How’s dealflow and WLB?
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HC > C&R, but neither is top group at Wells.
industrials/regl/M&A are the best
I know Industrials has great momentum and has been on some big deals recently, but I heard that they don't hold the pen on the models. Wouldn't that hurt exits?
Ex-WF Industrials here, yeah pen is barely held by Ind - go to M&A to save time. Additionally, while dealflow is good, a lot of Industrials analysts have been fucked over and have had no deal in the their first year (I know of analysts who have no M&A deal to show for in 1 year)
Perhaps industrials moved up but everything else seems correct
Not sure why the MS? This seems accurate based on WF overall market share, culture etc of the groups
This is correct
Would M&A or LevFin be better at WF for lateraling? Assuming lateral to a classic group i.e Industrials, C&R, TMT etc
Depends, how do you define strongest?
I'm not exactly sure what user meant, but I'm also an incoming CIB intern in Charlotte this summer and would love to hear which groups have the best exits, deal experience, plus any insights on return offer rates.
Did you not get sent the group overviews?
Any insights on return rates for the different groups?
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I was told heavily group dependent. Also, I heard that FSG and M/A have extremely low (~50%).
Source: Trust me bro
No way it's 50% return offer rate
Intern offer rates were around ~80% for IB. Sponsors had the most number of interns like 11 or so they returned less than other groups.
Ignore the tag, but worked at Wells during 2025 SA as a FT Analyst (An2). M&A was near 100% lol.
The return offer rates vary every year. No group consistently has higher or lower return offer rates.
Best non-REGAL group for PE/HF exits?
industrials, energy(houston), and fig for coverage, levfin/M&A good and sponsors seems to have good pe exits
Anyone know anything about their Leveraged DCM group and what typical exits from there look like?
LF is one of WF’s strongest groups, but the capital markets group within LevFin (which btw I don’t think even takes interns) is not one anyone goes to looking for exits. Like IGDCM, you go there to be a career banker. They have like 5 juniors total (I work in sponsors and have not seen anyone ever leave). No weekend work though I hear, so that’s dope.
Thanks, that's helpful! Is the LDCM team mostly just doing pricing and distribution work or do they also work on pitchbooks/models/LPs/CIMs, etc? Regarding exits from the LDCM group at WF, what do juniors typically exit to if they choose? I'm assuming LevFin Origination or even Sponsors group should be pretty seamless transitions.
what is sponsors like at Wells, do you guys run the model/execution?
Anyone know how feasible it is to internally move offices if you’re in a mid-upper mid group (IND/TMT/HC)?
HC is the worst group at WF by far FYI. Anyway, moving offices has nothing to do with group strength as it’s the decision of your own group whether to move you or not and the space they have in their NYC offices if you’re doing well in your internship, just flag to the intern manager that if you get an offer, you’d love for that offer to be for the NYC offices be humble when asking.
How is HC the worst? I heard it was good.
It’s just a growth area for WF. Has been for a while. It’s a super competitive space and we’ve always been waaay down the league tables. A few years ago we were like 30. Now we are higher, prob around 15. But that’s still very low compared to other groups. We rarely do major M&A in the space and certainly don’t do IPOs. We don’t even really cover the major pharma giants (at least we didn’t a few years ago). We may have covered them at the corporate banking level, but didn’t really have board level connectivity that you need to be successful. They’ve invested a lot in the HC coverage team, but it’s always been a dog compared to the other coverage groups. It is almost certainly still the lowest ranked coverage group overall at WF. We did ok in HC when everyone was doing SPACs, but that was only with tiny biopharm companies. And that was just because we were decent at SPACs.
What a lot of people don't realize is there's a lot of politics at play. A lot of groups are split out by vertical too, so some verticals may work in charlotte and others in NY, which also cause problems with movement (different MDs). I would say honestly you are better off trying to lateral to a better platform with better exits if you are going to wait a year.
Wells LevFin is really solid.
Is MF PC doable from LevFin?
Yes, plenty of exits like this
Coverage: FIG, Sponsors, REGAL
Product: M&A, DCM, LevFin
Sponsors at WFonly good because its sponsors coverage so good on a resume for recruiting. WF sponsors has incredibly low share of left lead activity. They are always on the right, often with small share of the deal. Other info seems mostly correct.
Could you please PM me when you get a chance? Want to learn more thanks
Wells industrials is having a strong year. Think they are on the come up, seen mandates in packaging and A&D as well as the Union Pacific deal.
is an internal lateral to ind possible from the dcm group after a year or so?
Definitely doable, ex-WF Ind here. Would say you should talk and network with folks. Maybe even express interest in WF IND DCM and then pivot the focus. Will likely need to take a year back.
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