A Day in the Life of an Investment Banking Analyst
“6:30 Sycophant drops by on his way out. Client meeting next Friday but wants complete turn of a pitch for first thing tomorrow morning (tomorrow morning = when he finally gets around to looking at it at some point next week). A quick calculation; there’s no way I’m getting out of here before four in the morning.”
-The Bitter Investment Banker Email
Ah, the life of an investment banking analyst.
What will your hours be? How much work do you actually do? Do you really just play Solitaire most of the day and then only work at night?
Some days you’ll be so busy that you have to discreetly use a bottle under your desk if you need to go to the bathroom.
Other days you’ll have so little to do that you can take 3-hour lunch breaks and download different themes for Windows Solitaire.
Doing investment banking is like doing drugs: on your good trips you dance in clouds of marshmallows, surrounded by beautiful women (or men) serving you fruit in canopies.
On your bad trips you scratch your eyes out and jump off buildings.
This 24-hour period was a bad trip. And unlike The Bitter Investment Banker Email, it actually happened.
7:30 AM – I am woken up by an Associate at work asking where I am. He told me to come in at 8:00 AM to send out a status report. It’s 7:30 and I’m not there yet, so a cloud of panic has descended. I roll out of bed, shower for a minute and head into work.
8:00 AM – 9:00 AM – The Associate hands me a marked-up version of the status report in question. Most of his changes consist of adding/deleting commas, capitalizing nouns or changing font sizes. I send it to our team at 8:55, in advance of our call at 9:00.
9:00 AM – 10:00 AM – Our investment banking team tells management about the buyers who are interested in them and the meetings we’ve set up.
I am vaguely listening but also working on a pitch book for an IPO in the background – multi-tasking is easy when all you do is copy and paste Excel into PowerPoint.
12:30 PM – We send out a draft of the IPO pitch book to 3 Managing Directors who will be at the meeting the next day. This is the “final” version, which means that everything will be scrapped and re-done in the next 24 hours.
12:45 PM – One of the Managing Directors is traveling and has requested a Briefing Book on the company we’re pitching because he doesn’t know anything about it. It’s not feasible to FedEx the book because he is 3,000 miles away and needs it ASAP – we need to PDF this bad boy.
1:00 PM – The Associate drops off revisions to a presentation we’re working on for another client. I tell him I don’t have bandwidth because I’m working on a big IPO pitch for the next day as well.
He tells me to finish by 5 so he can give me more changes and I can “turn” another revision by the morning. It’s probably going to be an all-nighter.
1:30 PM – One of the Managing Directors who received the Briefing Book calls another Associate (Associate #2) on my team and yells at him for sending 100 pages of material – it’s taking 30 minutes to print out everything.
The Associate takes the brunt of the damage. I’ve cleverly avoided the fallout by having Associate #2 be the point person for this project.
3:00 PM – Starbucks. The lifeblood of investment banking analysts. I go with a friend who’s in the midst of private equity interviews and we discuss how those are going.
3:30 PM – After speaking with our equity research analyst, the Managing Director decides we need to add more analysis to our pitch and focus on completely different metrics. I need to re-do most of my work.
5:00 PM – I finish up with the other client presentation that Associate #1 wanted me to finish. Now it’s a waiting game on that one as I continue revising the IPO pitch.
7:30 PM – I’m eating dinner at my desk. No time to go join everyone else today but it’s Japanese food so I’m satisfied. Meanwhile someone from Equity Capital Markets, the team responsible for IPOs, comes over and tells me to scrap all the analysis the MD wanted.
10:00 PM – I get last-minute changes from everyone else on the team. Shouldn’t take too long to process, but production can only start printing at midnight, which means I’m going to be here until 1 AM minimum.
10:15 PM – As I’m going through changes, Associate #1 stops by and has a bunch of changes to the client presentation I finished at 5 PM. I tell him I can only get started after 1 AM so I probably won’t have anything until the next morning. “Dance, monkey.”
12:30 AM – I finish up and production starts printing the presentations. Associate #2 comes over to “supervise” the production and review the finished product.
1:00 AM – I notice an inconsistency on 1 slide – stock prices have been updated earlier in the presentation but not here. Time to check over everything again.
2:00 AM – We’re done re-checking every single page for the same mistake now. Time to re-print.
2:15 AM – The printers all have paper jams and are out of ink. Since it’s late, the printing/production crew has disappeared and I have become the production team.
2:15 – 3:30 AM – I need to refill the ink and fix all the printers. This requires a group effort so I call some other analysts over to help.
4:00 AM – Go home and go to sleep. I need to wake up by 6 to finish work on the presentation Associate #1 told me to “finish by the morning.”
6:00 AM – I’ve overslept. Associate #1 is already up and has left 3 voicemails on my cell phone asking why I haven’t sent the presentation to our client yet. I Blackberry him that I was up all night working on another pitch and was going to send it by 9 but needed an hour of sleep first.
6:15 AM – 6:30 AM – As I’m coming into the office we’re trading angry emails back and forth. He says I should have emailed our entire group saying that the presentation would be late.
8:00 AM – Associate #1 strolls into the office just as I’m about to hit the “Send” button. I tell him that I’m about to send the presentation.
He tells me to email everyone twice – once to tell them that they’ll get the presentation in the next 2 minutes, and then once again to actually send the presentation.
I ignore him and just send the presentation.
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I am a finance major and pursuing my CFA. I noticed that in some previous posts you said the CFA was useless and would not help a cancidate get into investment banking. I do not understand why a CFA will not help? Could you please elaborate on this ?
Thanks,
Mike
http://www.mergersandinquisitions.com/stuff-investment-bankers-dont-like-cfa-activities-advanced-degrees/
http://www.mergersandinquisitions.com/cfa-investment-banking/
http://www.mergersandinquisitions.com/degrees-certifications/
http://www.mergersandinquisitions.com/cfa-vs-mba/
This sounds like a typical day verging on the bad end but definitely not the worst working day. I mean, did you stuff up anything major? Nope. Did you get abused repeatedly for no reason? Don’t think so. Did your emails get ignored for most of the day only to get a response at 10 just as you’re considering leave the office hereby causing you to stay another five hours? The only bad thing here is you got 1 hr of sleep. But when u consider the typical day consists of working til mid night and beyond anyway, is it really that bad???
There are probably worse days but this is the most detailed day for which I had records.
Forgive me for possibly seeing naive, but, are there no negative aspects of all the lost sleep?
From what I know about performance, sleep deprivation is the surest way to make errors (especially for repetitive, detail-oriented work).
How do bankers get around this?
Why do they not realize that all this sleep deprivation will take a tremendous drop in performance?
Eventually it does catch up with them, but if you’re young you can tolerate it better. But lots of bankers look like they’re 40+ when they’re still 25-30.
In addition to my last question, how does the sleep deprivation not cause people to make a lot of unnecessary errors?
Most of the work is mindless so it’s not that difficult… it’s not like you’re writing the Principia and need to re-invent physics.
Isn’t this a bit sad? You do mindless work but get paid a shitload?
Welcome to life after college, everything is mindless and stupid
Out of curiosty, do any of you guys think that all this work takes a toll on people’s social life. (i.e. long-term, do bankers have higher divorce rates than average, etc.)?
To me, nothing is worth losing my health and not being able to have a good family life. What do you guys think?
If you value your social life get out of finance now
Oh, god!
I’ve already majored on finance. Sad thing is I do not know what I can do besides finance, so my first job has to be in this field. IB sounds terrible to me. Trading doesn’t seem to be my piece of cake. Gotta find some other position more human in a bank!
The rumors are true about the life of an investment banking analyst. I truly enjoyed reading this post. No wonder most investment bankers are hard to get in contact with! I read other posts where you mentioned going to forums or networking events. Do you have any websites or more information on where I can find some to attend this summer? Thanks!
Yes read the FAQ
Which sectors of banking allow for more variety than others?
Even though I know the field has a lot more monotony than most at the junior levels, I’m starting to think that variety may make me happy while I get into finance.
(Prior to going to college, I had thought that I had focus and could tolerate boredom well; however, now I realize something close to the opposite may be true). I’m hoping variety may make sense.
All jobs are monotonous to some degree so nothing really, lots of people say trading is more fun than banking though
Is there no room for family life at all in the investment banking years? Also do people really loook 40 when they’re 25-30? That’s scary. Do they generally look better once they exit investment banking? I don’t even know if I want to do investment banking any more haha.
Yes most people look older than they are. Some people have families but usually they don’t have the best relationships with them.
Hello
I really enjoyed reading this article and discussion. Thanks for posting it
As a IB SA, how long would you say it takes to develop the analytical and conceptual skills behind all the Excel #s?
Depends how fast you learn and how efficient you are. I can’t answer it for you because I don’t know how you learn/work.
Can you elaborate a bit more? How long do you think the analysts/associates you work with expect you to take to learn the analytics and conceptuals? I’ve heard you do very little with technicals at the same time I’ve had friends who did an SA stint and said they learned a ton about accounting/finance
Probably a few weeks at most. It is not that complicated. Less if you do training or self-study.
So you’re telling me English/History/Econ majors from Harvard/Princeton/Yale/etc will be able to speak the lingo of an investment banker in a few weeks into the internship? Apologies for sounding skeptical but I find that a little hard to believe
We did not imply the above. What we meant was the lingo an IBing isn’t hard to pick up. You can do so a few weeks into the internship whatever your background is.
I am research analyst working in a buy side firm in Pakistan and have been covering the energy sector for the past three years. I have also been attending online lectures so that I can enhance my technical skill set related to the upstream segment (E&P companies).
I have been seriously contemplating enrolling in a uni to earn a petroleum engineering degree in order to specialize in the upstream segment. I have already completed my MBA (Major: Finance) and will be sitting for my CFA Level III in June-2012.
The reason for this post is to seek guidance and also to receive feedback so that I can make the most informed decision.
Whether you shd enroll in university to obtain a petroleum engineering degree is your call–I’m not familiar w the energy sector. CFA is good for equity research and your MBA should be helpful.
OMG….. This looks like a nightmare. I am a recent graduate and applied to become an IB analyst in London, but I guess I will reconsider that as I do want to enjoy life, or simply put : HAVE a life !
hehe I see this is very similar to a typical day in consulting. I mean, why do the same job at consulting and get paid less?
Because of the fees IB charge
Just 3 questions.
i read forbes and forture quite often. and these interviewers will ask the billionaire founders (NOT CEO) if you did not start this company, what would you be? they replied accountant. Well, assurance, CPA, audit seem to produce more founders than investment banking does. Do you have any thoughts on that?
Second questions: on working hours, which one is longer investment banking or private equity?
Third question: if i do wish to start up a company, let say family food & beverage business or property development company or maybe just like the innovative 3M. Would private equity have an edge over (deal-oriented salesman style investment banking)? Ultimately i would really like to start my own co. Thank you very much, i know its long. sorry about that.
Don’t have the stats so I can’t answer your question. Accountancy is useful because it gives you a base of understanding how business works etc but not a prerequisite to being a successful entrepreneur
Depends on the firm and your group. IB might be longer but PE has long hours too
You’ll have a sense of “ownership” in PE and you’ll also gain knowledge on evaluating portfolio companies for your firm so I’d say PE might be more useful though IBD can also be useful given the skills you gain as well as the connections you build.
Hi Guys,
1. Do you feel that finance is like a prison? (i.e. little room for creativity, lots of arbitrary/meaningless rules, etc.
2. What fields of finance are less like prison than others?
Thanks
1. Sometimes but if you want a highly creative job you wouldn’t be visiting this site right?
2. Some think that anything that requires one to sit in a cubicle/in an office the whole time feels like prison. So to be honest its not just finance, any other odd industry that requires you to sit in a cubicle (and pays way less) can feel like prison. And no I can’t answer this question because it depends on your perspective; and you are the one who controls your perspective. Some people genuinely enjoy being in banking and like the lifestyle + work FYI.
You forgot to mention: 4am-6am – dream about someday being just another overpaid greedy Wall Street VP douche
This article was fantastic..”final version” then scrapping everything. SO true. It really made me laugh!I worked in a small investment bank for 2 yrs. The hours were not as crazy. There were times of being too busy to remember going to the bathroom and other times of being bored. I’m doing my MSc Investment Analysis from the UK I’ve been out of investment banking for two years working in the finance and account dept of a company. I want to go back to that field hence my Masters. Should I apply for an analyst positions or associate positions? Some of the banking sites say if you have relevant experience and are doing your MBA or Masters in Finance you can apply for associate. Although I am not sure if I qualify for that?
If you’ve been an analyst in an IB before, I believe you shd qualify as either a third year analyst or first year associate. However, markets aren’t great so banks have been bumping people down FYI
People w MBA usually qualify as associates but as I’ve said before markets are tougher so you have to be flexible
Thanks for sharing, I am eager for a job as an Analyst in investment bank, except one thing: lack of sleep. I am going to have a master degree in finance in US, and wonder whether I need to practice sleep less from now?
May be a weired question. hope to reply…
Yes. You won’t be sleeping much in an IB. On a side note, and this is just my personal suggestion only, I’d suggest you to check out meditation because you might need that in finance and once you start meditating, you’d probably need less sleep.
This website has a lot of helpful information, thanks for the contribution.
I had a few questions because I am looking at getting into the finance/banking industry and am curious as to which path I should take.
First off, what courses are best suited for entry into the finance industry. I am primarily interested in dealing with stocks/stock market.
Secondly, are there any other banking/finance jobs that don’t require such long working hours? After looking at a career website I found a job closely related to an IB but the job title is listed as “Money Manager.” Investment banker is listed as another job but this one lists the core tasks as “Meet with investment bankers about investment opportunities,research companies to invest in and
Arrange transactions to make investments,” to name a few. Do you know if the job title is accurate and if so, are the hours really only 40 to 65 hours a week?
Lastly, I’m a Canadian so I’d probably be looking at a job on Bay Street (our Wall St.), am I right to assume the hours are probably no better?
Sorry for the long post but I would really appreciate if you could answer some of my questions. I totally understand if your unable to respond for any reason.
Thanks
1. Finance/Accounting
2. Private Banking/Asset Management
3. They should be relatively decent cause Canadians in general are pretty relaxed
Thanks for the reply! Do you know if private banking/asset management is generally an entry level job out of university? Also when you say the hours are relatively decent in Canada, do you mean work weeks are less than 80 hours or around the same? Thanks again!
Yes it can be
I’d think so – maybe max 60 hours a week but I haven’t worked in Canada so perhaps readers have better insights!
Firstly congrats on this site its really gonna help balance the field and giive some of those out of the know a better chance but here’s my, somewhat unrelated question As civil engineering student i got a 2:2 in first year cause i wasnt bothered can i still apply to investment banks for intenships who require a 2:1 minimum?
Yes you can though I’m not sure if you’ll make the cutoff.
Some great insights here and very similar to experiences I’ve found in Project Finance but at least I got to sleep for more than 2 hours! I’ve been away from banking 10 years getting a life with the family so how hard will it be to return to analysis & PF or IB life? Appreciate your ideas. thanks
How hard – depends on how much work & time you are willing to put in to land yourself the job and actually perform well on the job. I’d suggest you to figure out what you want to do w your career and what you are willing to “trade off” for the IB/PE lifestyle first
It is a very nice discussion. It is quite scary if I don’t get full sleep. Anyways I have completed my MBA in finance and currently working in sales & marketing field. Now I want to switch in finance field again. I have two options in my hand, one of forex trader and other one is IB analyst. I have 2 questions
1. Should I change sales jobs to finance one as I am not liking sales job but getting a good amount of money in it???
2. Which option should I choose either Trading or IB??
I would appreciate your suggestions.
Thanks
1. Depends on what your priorities are – can’t answer for you
2. Depends on what your goals are – you might want to refer to articles on our site re day in life of the two different roles. They can give you better ideas
I am a statistics major undergraduate student. What can I do for preparing to apply investment banking now?
http://www.mergersandinquisitions.com/get-a-banking-job/