Money, Hours, Models, Bottles: Investment Banking in New York, California, and Everywhere In Between

“Are you guys even in the office past 8 PM? Whenever I call no one’s there.”

“New York is hella lame, people are so much better out here.”

“If you say ‘hella’ again I’m going to make you pay for the bottles next time – and maybe the models too.”

“Fine, I’ll do some research and see what I can send over. NY is still overhyped, though.”

No, it’s not another short story (don’t worry, the finale of Cold Call to Closed Deal is coming up soon) – it’s a banker from NYC and one from San Francisco talking to each other.

And you read that headline correctly: today you’ll learn how banking differs in different regions of the US rather than going off on adventures to distant lands.

As one reader pointed out a while back, “Hearing about all these different countries is great, but what about how banking is different on the east coast vs. west coast and everywhere in between?”

Debt Capital Markets 101: How You Break In, What You Do, and What You Do Next

This one has been a long time coming, but it’s finally here: the debt capital markets article you’ve been waiting for since this site began.

In this interview with a reader who works in DCM in Canada, you’ll learn:

• How recruiting differs in DCM.
• What an average day in a DCM group is like.
• How DCM is different from Leveraged Finance, and pros and cons for each one.
• Differences between DCM groups in the US vs. Canada.
• The culture, pay, hours, and exit opps in DCM.

This one’s a monster and might just be the most in-depth interview ever featured here, so let’s get started.

Bottles and Bottles? How You Really Win Clients and Land Mega-Deals as an Investment Banker

Why does the mainstream media hate Wall Street so much?

You can think of dozens of reasons, but one of the biggest is that they don’t understand what bankers really do to earn their fees.

They see news of million-dollar bonuses and assume that financiers earn those bonuses by sitting around and playing Monopoly.

But you don’t earn massive fees by playing board games all day – it’s a process that takes years, which is one reason why bankers make the money they do.

And the infamous “pitch” has very little to do with it.