Why Lina Khan Might Actually Be the Best Thing That Happens to Young Bankers
Most senior bankers complain nonstop about Lina Khan. In their eyes, she slows down the mega deals, irritates their biggest clients, and cuts into this year’s fee pool. And if your entire worldview is built around the next twelve months, then sure, she feels like a problem.
But that mindset is incredibly short sighted. People judge her based on the deal sitting on their desk today, not the industry they are leaving behind for everyone coming up after them.
1. Short term thinkers focus on one blocked deal instead of the next decade of clients
A fifty year old MD is furious when the FTC questions a merger because it makes their job harder. These MDs already control Amazon, Apple, Google, Meta, or Microsoft and they have no intention of giving up those relationships. Their book is built.
But a twenty three year old analyst is never going to inherit Amazon. That client is locked away for life. So when industries consolidate and shrink, the people who get screwed are not the MDs. It is the new generation that has no companies left to cover.
2. Strong antitrust actually creates the opportunities young bankers will depend on
Whenever the FTC blocks a tech giant from acquiring another promising company, the old guard groans. What they miss is what that decision actually produces.
The target stays independent.
It keeps growing.
It becomes a mid cap.
It goes public.
It raises debt.
It starts acquiring others.
It becomes a real client for the next generation of bankers.
Antitrust does not eliminate dealflow.
It creates future dealflow by keeping more companies alive long enough to matter.
3. History shows antitrust is what fuels multi decade banking cycles
Every major period of strong antitrust created entire markets that investment banks thrived on.
The AT&T breakup created the modern telecom and mobile industry.
The IBM antitrust case opened the door to the personal computer era.
The Microsoft case created the space where Google, Amazon, and Facebook grew.
These were not deal killers. They were the spark for decades of IPOs, acquisitions, financings, and restructurings.
People forget this because they only care about what will pay out in the next bonus cycle.
4. The short sightedness in this industry is honestly wild
Senior MDs complaining about Lina Khan are doing it entirely for themselves. They are protecting the giant clients they already own. They will retire long before the damage from extreme consolidation becomes obvious.
Meanwhile, younger bankers need new companies to emerge, new sectors to form, and new CEOs to pitch. Without competition, the next generation has no shot at building their own coverage universe.
Lina Khan is one of the only people in government actually fighting to make sure the next generation has an industry worth entering.
5. The bottom line
Short sighted thinkers hate Lina Khan because she interferes with the next big fee they were planning to collect. Long term thinkers understand she is creating the next wave of companies, competition, and deal cycles that the younger generation will live off.
If you are a young banker, Lina Khan is not hurting your future. She might be the reason you have one.
It seems like this content is not included in my knowledge base. I'm sorry, but it looks like this may be out of my ability to answer... maybe some of the links below might help?
You bamboozled the bot
Appreciate you sharing! This is actually insightful
Some of the specific cases you provided don't quite match with what you are saying about them, but the underlying point is a good one.
Who is Lina khan? She hot?
Congrats on discovering ChatGPT. Shes one of those Ivy League school kids that were always told how smart they were growing up but in reality they were actually always really dumb
Zero substance in this comment - love it when people call her dumb without any substance
Do you want me to list out the amount of high profile cases she got demolished in?
I’ll chime in here. As someone who thinks we do need heavier enforcement of anti-trust and many of her actions are net positive, she is absolutely a moron/dei hire.
She wrote a thesis that basically amounted to big companies = bad. This ignores consumer welfare tests and basically a whole field of economic study. It was lauded by the academic/ law/ non-economic or business community, but most everyone who understands basic Econ was like this is borderline incoherent.
She was just massively inexperienced and lacked the business understanding to be in the role. Read her background or just her famous paper and you will get why people hate her.
great analysis dude
Please wipe the glaze off your face dude
i can't prove it but you're an only child
Found Lina’s account
Lol elite username
On the flip side no deal fees means shittier comp and less advancement opportunities in the short term, affecting long term prospects. It is a balance, but very interesting point to ponder.
There were deals happening under Lina Khan just not as many “blockbuster” deals
lowkey she kinda bad im ngl
Everyone talks and complains about price gouging, avoiding PE owned business because quality sucks, prices are sky high, and we should all spend our money locally - and talks about how CoL is sky high. Then shits on Lina Khan and defends mega corps. 2025 in a nut shell.
you sumed it up perfectly. I think this thread has a habit of worshipping PE CEOS/MDs/Partners while at the same time they can't afford their rent and live paycheck to paycheck.
Especially that thread 2 weeks ago when everyone in PE is commenting which industries to avoid PE owned businesses because of how much of a leech they are in society. r/whoosh
Everyone thinkin they a capitalist when they're really just the capital
Yes the capitalist aligning logos and spreading comps at 5am and responding to "pls fix".
Insane cognitive dissonance from growing up thinking bankers were considered "elites." Then realizing they're only upper middle class in most cases, and have to slave away their entire youth even to only reach that level.
Not even close to that level lol. Even if lets say you have an absolutely stellar career - your; worth 50m after you retire. Top .0001% of outcomes, billionares have literally hundreds of times the amount of wealth and power you have.
careers like banking/ bigLaw/Medicine can make you at best upper middle class in today's world, but people somehow think they will be the next parter at Apollo without taking any real risks
I'm split on Lina Khan because of the Democrats / liberals she aligns herself with. But otherwise, I do strongly agree with her stance on anti-consolidation / anti-trust.
She NOSE a lot about finance, we shouldn't question her.
yeah for some reason she just looks like a nosy person
She has a giant sniffer
I'm not a leftist by any means, but this country is in serious need of antitrust enforcement.
Agree but its funny how people were happy when Trump came into office cuz he would fire Lina Khan and deal flow would pick up. Like It's crazy how so many people here lack critical thinking skills and loved Trump.
Funnier because Vance and other Right wing people loved her.
Senior Bankers caring about their wallet is a very novel concept
Ultimately, I think these were the same senior bankers voting for the demise of the younger generation. With AI and mass consolidation running rampant, It wouldn't be far fetched to run into low deal flow coming years esp in Tech and HC. Also, don't forgot how Trump rejuvenated the US economy.....
As long as there are optimists and passionate folks creating new ideas, there will be flow.
Technocratic bureaucrats don’t grow the pie.
Yeah don’t disagree at all - we’re on such a strange economic trajectory right now that literally no one seems to have well thought out answers on. However, I think it’s pretty obvious that big-tech is becoming absurdly powerful in buisness, politics, and media. I mean Larry Ellison now pretty much controls TikTok, CBS, and possibly CNN if the WBD deal goes to them. Elon owns Twitter, and Zuck has Instagram. Basically in a situation where tech bros that control the president also control the media in a time where AI might rapidly change society. Pretty dystopian tbh.
But.... deal flow is back up and my bonus is higher
"There is a widespread conviction in the minds of the American people that the great corporations known as trusts are in certain of their features and tendencies hurtful to the general welfare.
This springs from no spirit of envy or uncharitableness, nor lack of pride in the great industrial achievements that have placed this country at the head of the nations struggling for commercial supremacy.
It does not rest upon a lack of intelligent appreciation of the necessity of meeting changing and changed conditions of trade with new methods, nor upon ignorance of the fact that combination of capital in the effort to accomplish great things is necessary when the world's progress demands that great things be done.
It is based upon sincere conviction that combination and concentration should be, not prohibited, but supervised and within reasonable limits controlled; and in my judgment this conviction is right."
-Theodore Roosevelt
Well said
Agreed - I made this post because I remember how during the Biden administration half the people on this thread were complaining about Lina Khan but somehow could not see the long term value in enforcing anti trust and calling her dumb.
Exactly. We need another Teddy Roosevelt.
Even if Lina Khan was Mayor of NYC, how would this matter for banks? NYC local government doesn't have authority over IB.
The response from the Right to Mamdani bringing her on as an advisor feels to me as the same as how people on the Left reacted to Elon Musk and DOGE.
This is a big nothing burger. I bet the largest impact she's going to have is just figuring out legal strategies for Mamdani to implement his rent control and free bus plans. And if she's successful in doing that, then there's still no impact on the M&A, DCM, ECM, LevFin markets because why would there be?
Unless you're overexposed to NYC real estate, you won't be affected.
My argument was how she good for the FTC not for NYC
DOGE and Musk is a bad comparison. They had a huge impact on the GOV. They were literally giving 19 year olds access to the everyone's social security #s.
Industry consolidation vs burgeoning small companies (for younger bankers to cover over the long term) are not mutually exclusive events. There can be large industry consolidation alongside newer, younger companies being created & developed for the next generation.
After a certain point, they become mutually exclusive. We are past that point which is the problem.
Sure, consolidation and new startups can technically happen at the same time, but that is not what we are seeing in reality. When a few dominant players control compute, distribution, and talent, they shape the entire incentive structure for everyone else. Founders stop thinking about building a full, durable business and start thinking about how fast they can create something shiny enough to get picked up by a giant.
Tell me this is not exactly what is happening in tech right now. People are not building companies with depth or staying power. They are building a feature, a gimmick, a thin layer on top of someone else’s infrastructure, and packaging it as a “future unicorn” so a big player acquires them before they run out of runway. These are not new companies and the moment they get acquired the entire teams gets gutted.
She's super pro consumer and has balls. I look forward to seeing what laws she finds on the books in NYC that can be used to help people.
Total speculation on my part:
If Wall Street really wants someone to worry about, I suspect if Democrats win the Presidency they’d look to appoint an Attorney General who would not be a do-nothing like Garland was.
In such a scenario, I can imagine Preet Bharara being appointed. He took down mobsters, terrorists, and multiple Wall Street execs.
Why posting about her now? Is trump bringing her back?
Error nostrum esse explicabo et est impedit. Mollitia autem excepturi expedita inventore qui consectetur praesentium. Error aperiam quos qui ducimus qui aut.
Et omnis quisquam et unde quidem. Itaque aut officia nisi totam rerum qui aliquam. Saepe dolore beatae impedit doloribus ducimus vel ut. Ex ipsam tempore temporibus reiciendis iste ut dolor mollitia.
Ullam quasi ut et amet quod quae mollitia. Quam velit nihil sunt praesentium dignissimos sunt ab nesciunt. Odio qui quaerat eaque quam voluptatem. Nesciunt omnis voluptatem corporis in aut ut. Dolores numquam maxime excepturi neque necessitatibus.
Perspiciatis et et impedit autem culpa. Corrupti magni et a deleniti nulla eum sint. Aliquam tempore amet maiores quasi quibusdam exercitationem sed. Magni et qui quos ab rerum perspiciatis odio.
See All Comments - 100% Free
WSO depends on everyone being able to pitch in when they know something. Unlock with your email and get bonus: 6 financial modeling lessons free ($199 value)
or Unlock with your social account...
Eligendi quia quo ut sit aut cumque voluptas nihil. Deleniti distinctio consequuntur molestiae iste.
Quam maxime consequatur est earum magnam magnam corrupti. Asperiores et omnis repellat nulla ducimus qui aut. Velit veniam enim mollitia vel et qui et. Corrupti voluptatum voluptas aut tempore tempore ea expedita. Sit quod atque consequatur quisquam atque ut beatae.
Veritatis reiciendis id eligendi amet dignissimos deserunt animi. Est temporibus eius nam sit dolores quo. Facere dolorem qui molestiae mollitia sed magni aliquam corrupti. Exercitationem natus aut iure voluptates et.
Omnis dolorem quia fugiat quidem. Optio minus omnis soluta architecto modi numquam et. Aut animi sed quia soluta. Voluptatem laborum ut ut omnis.
Rerum quasi sint non mollitia vel saepe laborum explicabo. Placeat nisi iusto sit veritatis et voluptatibus nulla. Itaque facere quibusdam et soluta id. Voluptas facere voluptas rerum quas.
Sit hic officiis maiores sunt et. Rerum et iusto nihil amet.