PE / IB in NYC from Cambridge compared to US colleges
Hi , I am currently a UK student applying to both UK and US colleges , planning to work in IB and PE as an end goal. I would like to ask if it is realistic to make it into private equity out of undergrad or onto a top IB analyst program at BB or EB in America from Cambridge compared to the Whartons and Harvards in America. I ask this because it would cost me 500k dollars compared to 30k pounds to go to college and whether this is worthwhile solely focusing on my chances on Wall St. Note i will not get any aid and am able to get a loan for the whole amount. Also, i would like to know if a T20 or lower is better for PE / IB (think Vanderbilt , UCB , UCLA , UVA) compared with Cambridge as I am aware that Harvard is of course better.
If you’re a non-US citizen at Cambridge trying to make it into US IB, very tough.
If you’re a US citizen at Cambridge trying to make it into US IB, doable.
For the first group, much better to start in the US. But keep in mind it’s not walk in the park as an int’l either. Just that you’ll have a shot vs. not having one.
Other path is to start in London and then transfer over. But will take a while and will might close off some PE recruiting that happens early on.
Thanks for the advice, I am a non US citizen but I have family over there and used to live there so green cards are not a major obstacle. So would it be worth turning down Cambridge for somewhere like UVA , UNC , or Vanderbilt with considerable debt if I am beyond certain I will work in IB/PE in the USA and green cards are not a major issue ?
I don’t know your situation but just having family and living there previously doesn’t get you a green card. It’s a lot harder than that.
But taking you at your word, guess it’s a tough call. Pros and cons both ways. Depends on how badly and sure you want to work in US finance. Can also do the lateral way from London. Or do a postgrad degree after Cambridge.
I think if choosing between Cambridge and a T10, would do T10. If Cambridge and vandy, probs Cambridge and try to come over another way.
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Applying from the UK is additionally hard because you will be applying in your first year and everyone else will be applying in their second year. So you’re going to be up against people who have freshman summer internships and other opportunities lined up. Diversity programs and sophomore summer internships also aren’t open to you unless you apply as a senior in high school which probably won’t go very well. Good luck man
Thanks for saying this , so do you think my chances at IB in USA are better at Cambridge or at a US Semi-Target (Rice, Vandy e.t.c.) as I very well may not get into anything ivy plus.
Also you might wanna change the username, Mr. Guildford country school
Kids just asking a few harmless questions about which uni to choose, just like many of us did on thestudentroom back in the day. Hardly a need for privacy. Well, that is as long as he decides to not be like the hundreds of other knuckle heads on this forum that leave a 15 year old trail of public comments, half of them being blackmail worthy and half of them directly referencing their work and school history making LinkedIn’s easy to find….
you don’t yet know if you’ll even like IB. Cambridge as a name will open many more doors in life than Vandy/Rice/etc… Frankly, you’d have to be an idiot to plan your life solely around IB at this point in your life
name brand is overrated. and between T20s and Oxbridge it is negligible in the long run. go where opportunity lie.
Name brand is def not overrated considering how much going to a good school helps. Although post Covid decline of on campus recruiting may change that
You know sometimes Americans genuinely concern me with how bad their fucking takes are.
UCLA Notable Alumni: Arnold Schwarzenegger and a few other actors and basketball players
Vanderbilt Alumni: Al gore, greg abbot, Bill Bain and then a bunch of other random D-list politicians and people that aren't widely known
Oxbridge alumni: Isaac Newton, Stephen Hawking, Charles Darwin, Rupert Murdoch, Robert Oppenheimer, John Keynes, Milton Friedman, Ernest Rutherford (Father of Nuclear physics), Adam Smith, Margaret Thatcher, Christopher Wren (Architect - Probably responsible for half of Londons tourism revenue today), John Milton, Alan Turing (Godfather of Computer Science), Oscar Wilde, William Wilberforce (Abolished Slave trade), Tony Blair, Indira Gandhi, Oliver Cromwell, J.R.R. Tolkien, David Attenborough, Bill Clinton, Imran Khan, Paul Dirac (A founder of quantum mechanics), fucking Robert Mugabe, First Leaders of Pakistan and Singapore, the last king of Yugoslavia, Cavendish(The guy who discovered hydrogen), An insane amount of Royalty and Monarchs, Probably half of the British prime ministers, Multiple Nobel prize winners
If oxbridge alumni never existed, humanity would probably be a decade or 2 behind where it is now. If Vanderbilt/UCLA alumni never existed then we wouldn't have terminator and Bain & Company. Which option do you think is more materially significant?
Oxbridge really and truly is only comparable to your top ivies not the rest of the T20. Going to Oxbridge is statistically significantly more likely to yield better results in life than going to a Vandy or UVA or UCLA or whatever.
I think the best rule of thumb to see if your college is comparable to oxbridge is to evaluate the commentary around their people in the industry. For example in IB, if a bank decided to recruit almost entirely from oxbridge they would probably be heralded as this insanely exclusive prestigious establishment whereas if they recruited purely from ucla/uva etc they wouldn't be seen as anything special. I have a great example of this and that was CVP London a few years back (and maybe to this day, im not sure) but to get in it was pretty much oxbridge or bust and this was when their emea dealflow was even inferior to that of a UBS; but nonetheless they would still have been seen as more prestige than ubs. Also For example, in quant trading Jane street London is known to be almost entirely oxbridge which adds a lot to the 'prestige' of the company (Though obviously its not like they need prestige) and makes it seem like a job so far out of reach for those non oxbridge.
Oxbridge and Top ivies is where banks recruit from as a matter of genuinely trying to make their banks look more 'prestigious' in the long term. Everything else is just a matter of having a good representation of different schools and pressure from seniors who are alumni who want to maintain their college presence within the firm, that's it. Wharton/Harvard and UVA presence within Evercore are good examples of that.
Cambridge offer holder here. Cambridge << US. This is kind of indisputable & necessary to accept. US economy is much more diversified, stronger, robust and leading in multiple different sectors, with the most advanced & developed financial system in the world. LDN is a good financial centre but not as robust + diversified + world leading as the States when it comes to industry.
Would recommend focusing on LDN IB opportunities and the process that comes with that, like SW, FY intern, SY SA, convert to FT, while also getting involved in ECs + good grades.
If I were in your position. I would NOT go to Vanderbilt/UVA for the chance to start my career on Wall Street over going to Cambridge to start my career in the City of London. But, UCB Economics is a strong program for that, and maybe UCLA. Overall, I think it's better to go one of UK's solid universities and start your career in London, then go to a second tier US university for the chance to start on Wall St.
Caveat is that there is probably more opportunities in the US. But it's a dice roll as LDN is a big enough market such that you would def find sth in finance from Cambridge
What started the argument above 'between T20s and Oxbridge it is negligible in the long run. go where opportunity lie.' Key phrase: 'in the long run'.
You realise the only way to garner wealth 'in the long run' isn't just becoming an MFPE partner right? And even still by becoming a partner in London, you don't think you have the freedom to just move to the states at that point?
I am fucking sorry but overall your average kid leaving fucking vandy, ucla or whatever the fuck will not have the same long-term potential as your average kid leaving Cambridge, whether that be a career in law, tech, finance, politics.... UC Berkeley okay that's fair enough but we obviously weren't talking about those technically non-ivy equivalents like Berkeley/stanford/mit. UVA maybe for finance they have the edge but that's pretty much it. For reference here are the top 20 colleges by UHNW Alumni, and oxbridge's ranking is incredible considering the lower opportunity set within the UK.
I am just trying to answer the question at hand accurately... I understand that Cambridge is a really good school. It's just that if he wants to go into US PE he will have an easier time breaking in from a target in the US rather than Cambridge. That's a fact – you can MS me all you want lol. Also using more general lists like this to answer a specific question doesn't serve any purpose, for example, a CS student wouldn't look at this list and decide to go to Northwestern or UPenn over MIT, CMU, Oxbridge, Berkeley, and CalTech for a CS PhD just because they have more UHNW alumni and a pre-med student who wants to practice in the US wouldn't go to an overall more prestigious international school for undergrad because it's just statistically much harder to get into US med schools coming from an international school. This is such a sorry situation where someone is clearly pushing a personal agenda instead of actually trying to help a kid out, fucking hell. (Also if you actually took the time to read my response you would see that I literally recommended that OP go to Cambridge over semi-targets like UCLA and Vanderbilt – I guess reading comprehension isn't really a strong suit across the pond).
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