Chicago PE Rankings

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Have heard anecdotally that pay at the Chicago “Big 3” was more like $350k+ last year, which is obviously a pretty ridiculous amount of money for a 24 year old in Chicago. Have to remember BDT has the merchant banking model, so you’d work on advisory projects for retainer clients as well as investing. GTCR has lights out returns, but have heard it’s extremely sweaty. Don’t know as much about MDP unfortunately - think they’ve had solid but not stellar returns, really solid b-school placement, and have heard a stuffy and somewhat sweaty, but not inhumane, culture.

Below that, you’re typically looking at sector specific funds, with a lot of healthcare, industrials and some consumer. Vistria just raised a big fund ($3bn) and seems like they’ve had solid returns. I’ve heard Round Table crushes it. 
 

Honestly though if I were you I would just focus on getting in to as many processes with the big 3 as you can for on-cycle (moving laterally to the middle markets from any of those names shouldn’t be a problem at the senior associate / VP level) and then focus on some of the high quality middle market names. You could probably get to a list of about 10 shops and go from there. Chicago recruiting tends to be a lot less structured anyway.

Anyone know which head hunters serve the private credit funds in Chicago? (Whitehorse, Comvest, Bain private credit)