Struggling on how to Approach FT 24 Analyst Recruiting

Hi everyone, wanted to see if anyone might have advice related to approaching FT '24 recruiting.

I am going into my fourth year of university with a near 4.0 GPA at a target school (completing a 3+1 Bachelors/Masters not in finance but in a finance adjacent field). I interned this last summer for a well-known Special Situations Investment team (Hybrid Credit/Equity). I have also interned previously in growth/private equity, and financial policy consulting (govt). While my performance this summer was considered near the top of my intern class across the board (this was communicated to me by my intern manager), I did not receive a full-time offer for FT '24. This is primarily a result of the team recently undergoing a restructuring, prioritizing geographically local interns, and having a rough Q2 (the team gave 30-40% of intern class return offers as opposed to a previously conveyed 80% estimate) - again this reasoning was communicated to me.

It was likely silly of me to not hedge against the risk of not getting a return offer, but I did not begin recruiting for FT until last week, after finding out about the return offer results, as I was under the impression that my full-time offer was close to guaranteed and I was quite happy with the team and work I was doing. I am happy working in IB, PE, Special Situations, or Growth Equity (Also applying to certain management consulting firms as I enjoy the strategy) and have applied to many of the posted positions that I can find. Geography does not matter too much to me but I would like to be in a major office for a given firm (NY/Boston/Chicago/San Fran/London/Etc). A couple of members of the team I worked on this last summer have conveyed that they would be more than happy to serve as a reference to my performance.

I'm a bit at a loss as available positions seem far and few between and perhaps it is because I have not heard back from any teams as of yet but conversation around the financial climate and lack of jobs has me stressed. I am looking up firms and their posted positions, looking on job posting sites like HandShake, and am reaching out to individuals on the teams that I am applying to network but feel like I am super behind on the recruiting cycle and that there are not many positions out there.

In essence, I was wondering if anyone has particular advice on how to approach full-time analyst recruiting. I have read different opinions on how this process works for individuals who did not receive a full-time return offer. Are there likely positions that have yet to be posted or (because of the economic climate and industry slowdown) are most of the available positions already posted?

Thanks and appreciate any and all advice!