There are many different exit opportunities that you can pursue after completing your investment banking analyst stint. I mean its one of the biggest selling points of breaking into investment banking.. You can decide to lateral within the sellside, jump to the buyside, take a break in corp.fin, or start your own business after realizing thats where the real money resides. I wanted to focus on START UPS in this thread and share some of the startups that I have witnessed fellow investment banking analysts begin personally and others that I have heard stories of during my almost 4 years on Wall Street.
VeeV: Two brothers started an açaí berry liqueur after working at GSachs. This is a good one. So two brothers at GSachs.. Hm.. Connections?!? Yeah, so these literal banker bros deff had an inside man but I guess thats how the world works. They were able to source capital to begin VeeV through the connections that they made at GSachs. At the end of the day, they were probably trying to get laid at 1 Oak in NY but VeeV exemplifies the connections that can be made to pools of capital quickly in an IB career.
Chubbies Shorts: Analysts from LazardAdvisory decided that they wanted to ditch the slacks and get into a pair of Chubbies. Founders said that they learned more in 2 years than they ever expected and when they left they were still young enough to take the risk of a start up vs. finding another "job". After investment banking you have enough capital and usually don't have a family to look after unless you got cuffed EARLY making for a perfect start up storm.
LogoIntern: Lastly, this banker realized that he was truly over copy-pasting logos into pitch decks.. He was so over it that he decided to create a program to do it for you (I wonder how many logos he copy-pasted) Banking and corporate america places you into an archaic environment that is only beginning to be penetrated by younger generations who are more fluent in software. If you identify a simple problem in the unfortunately software inept industry the opportunity can be huge.
What do you guys think about starting a business after investment banking? Have you heard of stories of your friends starting a business after their career in finance? What are the transferable skills from banking into the start up world? Lets have a conversation about it.
I mean we have real skills as investment bankers. The pros that lead ex-investment banking analysts as perfect start up cofounders are:
Save up money fast - money gives you time and resources to explore. I have been in IB for 3 years and have been able to save north of 150k. I cant think of any other industry that offers that opportunity.
Learn to work really hard and efficiently, while delivering quality - self explanatory. Essentially, you learn how to grind harder than you did when you were studying for finals..
Do the nontechnical version of coding - excel is always laughed at by coders but it is one of the most powerful tools. Exiting IB you ability to manipulate a CSV will not go to waste
Learn to deal with people under very high stress - multibillion dollar deals, dealing with passionate CEOs, late nights, and MDs that are looking for perfection. Yeah its stressful and so is starting your own business.
Become an excellent multitasker - working on s strategic M&A, capital raise, bankruptcy, and getting coffee for your boss at the same time that doesnt happen anywhere else. Starting a business is multifaceted and your going to need to be an excellent multitasker
The VeeV story is hilarious.. I can imagine these clowns in the club going around with their own liqueur