[Career Advice] What internship will give me best chance at improving my resume to land a full time IB offer in the fall?
I'm currently a junior finance major at a semi-target right next to an industry hub. I'm looking at internships for this 2019 summer about to lock one down but wondering which one would provide me with the best chance at landing an IB offer in the fall of 2019 at a boutique bank, bulge is easily out of my reach. I know I am behind the wagon on my late interest in investment banking as I should've tried to snag an internship this fall (my junior year fall) as it's more common to get an internship than just a full time offer since I am graduating next year in the spring 2020. My previous two internships have been working within the finance division of a public company and the other one was with a small brokerage firm where I acted as a credit analyst.
I had a super day with a small PE firm but unfortunately it didn't work out so my current options for an internship this summer are:
- A portfolio compliance intern at a large fixed-income investment management firm
- A financial analyst intern at a medium sized company where I would be doing evaluation modeling, due diligence, and report writing
- A top 25 consulting firm intern where I would be in the corporate performance improvement division
- Shadow/intern at a start-up tiny private investment bank with only 2 employees OR just begin to cold email local boutique banks to try to land something
Sorry for the long post and if there are any dumb assumptions/questions as I am rather ignorant when it comes to the beast that is the IB industry. Any sort of advice or thoughts on which option for this summer will best propel me into having a shot at an IB offer in the upcoming fall are much appreciated. Thank you.
Some people might recommend the tiny investment bank but I see that as more of a sophomore internship / winter internship. I personally would go for the financial analyst intern role due to the modeling, due diligence, and report writing as that is the closest to the role of an IB analyst out of your current options. A close second would be the consulting firm because it likely has a decent brand name that will be recognized and consulting is good experience as an intern
So a financial analyst role should give me better experience that will transfer to IB rather than a small firm of either IB or PE? I do get that it seems more like a sophomore internship but I would think it would be better for "my story" and also to show I have at least some experience
Yes because the work you do at a tiny shop is nowhere near the level of work you need to do at a MM or LMM shop. It is much smaller and a lot of time the valuation strategies are pretty different and not as fundamental. You're still doing modeling and valuation work at the financial analyst role and the work since it is a medium sized company will be closer to the work done at where you hopefully work in the future
May be a dumb question, but how many employees or size of the firm constitutes a MM or LMM rather than a tiny shop?
Not at all. I would just say it’s more about the deals than the number of people. If you do smaller deals, you tend to need less people so they’re smaller / have less back office help
Financial analyst/consulting options IMO
Can you explain the reasoning for why not a small PE firm or small IB? I was thinking those skills would be more transferrable and would be easy to tie into my 'Why" story.
It depends on the boutique vs mid sized company, if the other people in the financial analyst role are ex-bankers, they may be able to help, on the other hand, the small bank has bankers who probably can introduce you to bigger firms. A buddy did the latter and he got into a respectable industry specific boutique
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