Simple enough question.
what do you consider a good bonus as a % of base salary at analyst, associate and VP levels. I guess beyond that becomes very specific to deals being brought in by the directors and MD.
Also whatever is considered good now; how did it compare to the 2000s as well as the 2010s in your opinion.
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Zero? Anything more than that is ... well, a bonus
Zero is the wrong answer. The bonus is part of your compensation, not some “extra” pat on the back. It is meant as an incentive, a way to differentiate those who had outsized impact, and a way to manage cash flows (from the firm’s perspective).
While you should not count on a bonus for something very important in your life, a no bonus is a sign that something is very wrong (with you or the firm), this isn’t a standard corporate job where most of your pay is in your salary.
As for the question above I would say “good/solid” is about 60-70% of your salary at the analyst level (so about $50-60k)
For associate I would go with 80-100%
At VP at many firms there starts to be differentiation (group dependent and cash/equity split). So you can end up with similar to associate or go significantly higher (I’ve seen people at VP get stuck at $330-350 all in due to group performance).
Keep in mind that the % can change as banks figure out how much they want to guarantee vs put in bonus. So mostly anchor to the total comp numbers (edit: I’m holding total comp ~150 for 1st yr analyst and ~300 for 1st yr associate as “good/fine”).
That would take away the whole point of IB since you can find many corporate jobs with similar base pays to IB but with a fraction of the hours and stress.
100% of base - EB Analyst
150% - 160% of base - EB associate
Is this a ‘good’ bonus or a top bucket/on the high end bonus? 1.5x salary for an EB Associate seems amazing ..
could you please provide some insight into what a mid bucket/good bonus for an Analyst and an Associate would be at a BB?
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