Sales and Trading Bonuses 2023

It's close to the end of the year and you know what that means. Another bonus season is soon to be upon us.

Obviously headlines have not been encouraging recently, but would like to get some chatter going about what expectations are. 

Let me get the ball rolling:

BB AN2 (will be AN3 after this bonus round)

Base $125k 

Expected bonus $90k

154 Comments
 

Haha I just threw 140k out of my ass while I drunkenly wrote that.  But this year has been phenomenal for my desk so I do expect an outlier number.

 

US banks won't pay in line with revenues this year except for top outliers that have leverage/offers/known to be in a team targeted by competition.

CEOs have decided they needed to cut comp due to economic outlook, IBD being a clusterfuck this year, and some potential other dead bodies we still don't know about (whatsapp/regulatory fines ? Elon musk tesla margin loans going belly up ? other ?)

To give an idea, i am hearing that the best department at my place (Commods) is up 70-80% Yoy but the pool is flat.

 

Coconut1983

To give an idea, i am hearing that the best department at my place (Commods) is up 70-80% Yoy but the pool is flat.

I get why they are doing this but this is so fucked up.

 

Is that a stub bonus and did most people on your team get lower bonuses? 

 

Did you have competing offers? Bonus is about 100k higher than others in this thread, wondering how your situation was different?

 

Citi ficc vp1

My tram sucks. base unchanged, bonus below 100k. Will leave soon

Heard a few vp-d on other desks made very good money

 

D1, Exotics top BB

Slightly more than 1m total vs 800 last year.

(around 350 fixed 650 bonus - 350/300 cash/deferred stock)

Had competing offer + desk is up significantly vs last year…

And they tested the waters trying to not honour the deal but did in the end.

This year is a bit garbage, unless you were top tier desk and/or competing offer you got hosed.

Plenty of zeros or big double digit cuts. Lucky to have timed the offer.

Almost thinking to bounce elsewhere this year as that created a bit of tension.

 

FYI quite a few people at different banks have received around 100% of base (An/As). Will caveat that by mentioning they are all top bucket. Not sure how it came about that people at the same juniority in the same division are having widely varied comp assuming the people receiving 40k aren’t very bottom bucket. 

 
maplesyrup334

What is the bonus based on? I thought analysts don't put on trades ? 

S&T analyst bonus works basically the same as IB. There are buckets, you'll be ranked based on performance (and political capital of your manager and the usual BS like that). The pool will be based on bank/S&T wide performance and not too much on specific desk.

(Note, this applies to formal analyst programs, if you are on your desk's actual P&L it might be different)

 

Anonymous Monkey

Junior Power Trader (AN1)

Prop shop

Base: 150k

Bonus: 350k

Pretty happy, but good year for the firm.

PM? Interested in learning about the firm.

No pain no game.
 

BB S&T

Analyst 1 starting salary: £70 base

Analyst 2 (4-5 months after joining, everyone got upgraded to A2 in the new year): £75 base, £30k pro rated bonus

Not disappointed about comp. Only disappointment comes when realising American colleagues are better paid for the same job even when accounting for living expense differences across different geographies.

 
Most Helpful

Sales at BBs is not easy, it has its own form of stress. Clients are ruthless, you’re fully commoditized, because really clients just trade with best pricing and at the end of the day don’t really care for the sales person, they care for the name on the door most times (banks don’t stress when seniors leave, they just pass the accounts to the next man up assuming you’re reliable). Just ask a buy side to name all their coverages and most times they name the banks they know, and then 1 or maybe 2 sales guys specifically they like. That  being said, I wouldn’t say sales necessarily needs to be paid more, but for how volatile the seat actually is, how little exit ops exist (you rank very low on the desirability from hiring managers vs other departments) it’s just not enough of a bag to say it’s worth beating yourself up over. I resonate with this comment, my 1st year associate all in salary was 235k, which is really just insane for a 60 hour job, but all other components considered it’s just not worth it, if you get cut loose it’s pretty much zero chance you make the same amount considering the exits are to like other sales jobs in other industries or hoping another bank has a seat in your product open.
 

I make less now doing a more technical role (research), but I feel a lot more comfortable in if I need to jump ship I have a lot more doors open and people willing to talk. My lateral to research was hell, but seems the exit op recruiting conversations and overall career experience are night and day. 

 

Hey yea I did not mean to sound ungrateful. I am grateful but $175k is actually not a lot for what the role is. I’m also comparing myself to peers.

I have excellent reviews so it isn’t performance related, more politics, but for instance last year best paid 3rd yr analysts in sales got $85k bonus on a really down year for banks. This year was supposed to be 1-5% better at least and i got $50k so in that sense Im like ok im getting screwed here.

But to also echo above posters its about the stress, about getting yelled at left and right by clients, traders, your bosses. 60 hour weeks in NYC where lifestyle keeps getting more and more expensive. Also 60 hours seems like not much to an IBD analyst but anyone in S&T knows that 60 hours here means 60 hours chained to the desk being honed in. You’re not playing xbox WFH waiting for comments at 1am on a deck.

~4 years into a ‘wall street’ career and I have yet to crack $200k comp in NYC. I think you can appreciate how the cost/benefit isn’t really balancing out?

I don’t expect everyone to agree but this is just my perspective. Just being transparent so others have multiple points of view and can inform their decisions.

Hope you are all doing well.

 

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