DILEMMA - Advice much appreciated

Some brief background, I go to a complete nontarget, have a low gpa for banking, networked my ass off to get internships and I know how lucky I am to be in this dilemma at the moment, but would really appreciate your advice.

I have a return offer from the shop I worked at this past summer, which is a decent MM firm, but they mostly act as co-managers on equity deals with a little M&A here and there. The offer is also below street, but that's irrelevant at this point in my career.

A better MM firm extended me the opportunity to interview with them a few weeks ago after they gave out all FT offers and said they would notify me ASAP if someone didn't accept and I got that email today. The VP asked if I made my decision with my prior firm and if I was still looking. They want to fly me up and have a superday, (but with one spot on the table, I really think this is my job to lose-- i summered in the same sector and the reason I interviewed late was because I talked to an MD (network call) after offers were made and they set up an interview and explained the situation. This firm is in a MUCH better location, all i will be doing is M&A and pays street.

What do I do?

The industry is small and I don't want to ruin my career before I start it. These banks also work in the same space and there are some connections via Linkedin between the 2 firms.

Note: I am sure procedures are much different at smaller banks than MM's but I have spoken with my MD from summer a lot regarding my offer and terms, it's not like I only speak to HR.

 

And I believe the second firm knows this because I told them when my offer expired on two different occasions. Can I be upfront with the second firm and tell them I have accepted, but would love to move forward with them, or is this looked at negatively? Or should I just be grateful I have a banking gig and thank the second firm, but tell then due to time constraints I had to sign the other offer?

 

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