PWP/GHL/Guggenheim

I work at PWP but have friends at Guggenheim so want to throw that out there. This thread has become way too long and isn't productive. Once you start full time, no one cares about these comparisons (unless you're a super finance hardo and have no life, in which case I really hope you choose a different bank) From what I've noticed, analysts at Guggenheim have much better lifestyles. Think the culture is good at all three (you'll still be working a ton). Gugg has the best summer internship culture by far, apparently there's a fun event every week (someone confirm) 1. Class Size: Guggenheim's M&A class is around 45-50 (why would you give the kid MS for stating a fact), much bigger than our class so obviously more low quality analysts slip in at Guggenheim. However, analyst quality varies at every bank and that's due to the importance of connections (who your mom / dad knows); relationship hires don't always make the best analysts. There's less room for these kids at PWP because of the small class size. But there're benefits to large class sizes (more future connections, etc.), which no one on this thread has mentioned. Less analysts is not always better 2. Exits: some PWP kids have better exits than Guggenheim kids, and some Gugg kids have better exits than PWP kids. It depends on the quality of the analyst, your undergrad school / GPA, how well you interview, etc. If you're mediocre, PWP's name is not going to save you and you will not exit well (this is true of mediocre analysts at GS / Evercore or whichever bank WSO idolizes). The average PWP analyst has better exits than the average Guggenheim analyst solely due to the smaller class size. If you take two identical twins with the same stats and abilities and one worked at Gugg and one worked at PWP, I'm sure they would exit to the same place. Average class exit is not a good metric to use because it doesn't reflect your own abilities. Key takeaway: top analysts at any of these banks go to MFs / UMMs (and sometimes MM if they're unlucky given how random and competitive recruiting is), middle bucket analysts go to MM / LMM shops and bottom bucket analysts go to no-name buy-side shops / don't go buy-side 3. Deal Flow: Guggenheim does more deals than PWP (both banks do more than Greenhill), BUT the average Gugg deal size is smaller (obviously because there are only so many megacap deals). However, smaller deals require just as much, if not more work, so you still need analysts. I don't have a comparison of deal / analyst but you should end your analyst years with at least a couple at either bank. All three banks do megacap deals Gugg doing more deals than PWP is common sense. It doesn't matter how strong the analyst, there's only so much he / she can handle at once. And Gugg isn't a charity, they don't just hire analysts because they want to launch their careers You better be doing deals Also, there's an obsession with deals on WSO. I guarantee that after you do one (maybe two), you'll never want to do another one. They're a ton of work and most people would rather be chilling Hope this was helpful. Now go on and do something more productive