Is corporate banking culture also really bad?
With all of the recent discussions around IB and the awful culture and work/life balance, I’ve become worried about moving from Commercial to Corporate Banking.
Does Corporate Banking have the same issues plaguing it as Investment Banking does?
Will one not be able to see their girlfriend on weekends or evenings, not be able to use their full vacation, and have limited time for social life in Corporate Banking for even less pay?
Should I just stay in Commercial Banking where I earn 115K/year and work 50 hours a week?
It can be bad, but I'd argue culture is materially better in corporate because they don't want high turnover.
Now when there are a lot of live deals going on, expect to have some weeks with similar work/life balance to IB. However, your higher bonus should make up for that.
Generally I feel like people in corporate banking are pretty respectful of your time, but you will have busy periods where you need to deliver within a short time frame (e.g., you need to fully underwrite an acquisition bridge loan over a weekend because the acquisition is to be announced before Monday's open). I have also worked with people who don't know what they want to see in a presentation, credit, etc., which results in many iterations and a lot of stress (this might feel a bit like IB).
The hours are usually significantly better than IB on average - as an Analyst and Associate I was usually in the 60 hr/week range (e.g., 12 hrs Mon-Thurs and 10 hrs Friday). Work on the weekends is occasional. Longer hours mean that you are working on something interesting. Given that hours are less, you can plan a life (i.e., I am going to work later on Mon-Tues because I am doing something on Wed evening). Urgent situations come up pretty infrequently.
You will pitch less than in IB because you are a product group and you are only pitching in specific situations and to clients whom the bank would want to extend capital. There is pressure to generate additional revenue at senior levels, not dissimilar to commercial banking, but your coverage is pretty focused. Corporate banking groups are generally aligned to IB coverage and banks will prioritize where to allocate the bank's capital (you can't do an unlimited number of new deals). I have found this to be less pressure because your opportunity set is somewhat defined.
Overall, corporate banking is a pretty sustainable path. The comp is decent for hours worked. Progression can be a bit slower because there is less attrition than IB.
Bump
I did Corp. banking for 2 years for a $10B portfolio. Only put in 45 hours a week and work was super easy and boring. However, it did seem like the gig was pretty solid as a senior banker.
The VP’s comment above is pretty accurate. The biggest thing to point out is you want to be at a bank where they group/house corporate & investment banking together. Some places will call it corporate banking but it’s much more like commercial banking and so is the pay. I worked in CB as an analyst for 2 years before moving to my IB gig. I’m definitely thinking about going back. The pay / WLB is a pretty great balance. For reference as an analyst, my pay as a first year all in was about $115K and all in second year was about $130K. Hours are much more manageable as timelines are more spread out and you have more visibility into your schedule and clients are a little more laid back and things slightly less time sensitive
Hi there,
Would it be okay if I DM'd you to ask you a few more questions about your experience?
Since you’re anon would you say which firm this was / was it a BB? And what year? Curious how A1-3 comp has progressed / where it stands today.
Energy group at a large International Japanese bank.
Pay was:
Analyst 1: $75K salary, 10k sign-on, $20k bonus
Analyst 2: $80k salary and 25K bonus
Associate 1: $88K salary - I bounced because it was materially under market and transferable skill-set was not improving
I was at STRH/Truist. Although I will say with the merger they have restructured CIB and I don’t think they’ll be hiring any more CB analysts. They basically went to a 100% industry coverage model (before CB were generalists covering a geography & IB had normal industry coverage groups). They fired some VPs and MDs in CB and then with the ones that were left over they moved them to industry groups to cover a specific sub-vertical. Analysts were then placed into industry coverage groups so basically the separate CB groups are gone now
I can echo that. My bank transitioned to the IB/CB umbrella when I was leaving but our IB was weak besides DCM anyway. Our leasing and project finance was pretty dominant tho. I would say my role was mainly commercial banking work besides looking at profitability for the bank as a whole and pitches with other product groups. I made $105k Y1 and $110 Y2.
whats the difference between (in terms of the work) CIB, IB and CB. Is IB and CB work combined in that role
In a corporate banking role now and I can say it really depends on the bank. Also depends on what industry you are supporting too
A lot of corporate banking is lumped into the CIB naming these days since banks are capital markets focused, but corporate banking is just elevated commercial. I'll say that you need to choose right vertical to support in corp bank as this makes or breaks the experience to a large degree. Energy banking is losing luster fast and firms have left the corp lending space for oil & gas across Houston making it challenging for smaller non IG deals to get done. Look at what happened with BMO look at Credit Ag leaving energy space, look at Whitney selling its whole book at 50% loss, look at ABN closing US lending due to large losses, look at all the energy related loan losses in the bank reports and filings and banks retrenching. Hard to make money when all the revenue has been reset from some notable bankruptcies and collapsed names. And it's often very boring
Culture can be fine if you work with respectful directors and VPs, sadly some of them reach that point of being "too good" to do "analyst" tasks, similar to the IB forum posts I've seen here. That begins to eat away at the experience and you get frustrated real fast. You'll get deals that periodically eat weekend, nights but usually for specific events and acquisitions and restructuring the balance sheet for some reason or because the sponsor is raising a fuss. But a lot of corp banking staff on junior level are unhappy maybe to different degree than IB analyst threads on here but it's interesting since banking hasn't actually gone in reverse during WFH sadly. Still broken industry behind the times
Biggest issue with corporate is that you often go tooth and nail with the same lead banks and there is a reason JPM and the big guys agent most deals. A lot of participating in deals that never pay and never get other fees from. Work life can be fine but again depends on bank and how many time suck projects you get. At my bank we do so many ad hoc reports and the "execs" in Calgary and Toronto are always wanting something to justify XYZ or see XYZ. Not overly valuable work but huge time suck with no real value being added. Other big drag is how layered corp credit is and how many people need to opine on the same thing, you'll literally have emails forwarded, reforwarded and circled across people just agreeing with each other as CYA. If you're considering the switch I'd avoid energy
Would it be possible to connect with you over DMs to chat a little more about your experience? Are you based in Toronto?
Sure
I interned in the PE/VC group at a regional commercial bank (SVB, Comerica, First Republic, etc.) and the team members were great. Almost everyone from the MDs down had super manageable hours and good pay/benefits. Setting up capital call lines was a straightforward process with little technical finance. Any schmoozing/networking was with PE/VC MDs and if you’re really good you can become an operator/CFO at a fund. Analysts/managers only stayed late if s deal was super close to closing. Honestly an amazing path if you want to have a life and don’t care about being directly involved in making investments. Similar benefits to funds but less pay and a great work life balance.
Going on my 5th year in Corporate Banking and can confirm hours are pretty fair to pay ratio. As an Associate I was doing 35hrs avg. for $150k now VP $230k for 50-60hrs. I’d highly recommend the career path and do something fun with your free time like bang women, play video games, and go to the gym.
Was this in Toronto?
Nope
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