Investment banking is known to be one of the Wall Street’s most coveted & appealing jobs. But it’s also one of the strenuous and hardest, in terms of the hours on the job and obviously, the not so well known stress part. Ever wondered what’s an average day in the life of an investment banker? Let’s dig deeper into it!
The days are usually very long and stressful in the life of an investment banker. In order to have a financially rewarding career, they need to work 90 to 100 hours per week or even more. The mornings usually start with lots of administrative emails and office meetings. Responding to them is the most consistent part of any investment banker’s day. Sometimes they get messages from co-workers and senior bankers who require each status report, presentation and calculation double or sometimes triple-checked! As crazy as it sounds, but this is very normal.
In the morning, associates and analysts typically work on company analyses and make certain adjustments as per the requirement of the senior staff. Usually, there’s no such opportunity for social media since each of the investment banking has firewalls for avoiding such websites providing entertainment. Afternoon break normally falls somewhere between 1-2p.m which includes a 45-minute at local cafeterias. After coming back to their desks, associates get busy in reviewing the documents and make corrections for sending them back to the analysts. Usually, the senior bankers are obsessed about dotting and crossing all the appropriate letters. The afternoon work is all about focusing intensely on the active deal without affording to have little mistakes.
Dinner is always eaten at the office only, around 7-8 p.m. The analysts require work to be completed by the early evening so that it can be reviewed again. The work is more scheduled and predictable always. After finishing the updates they can head home to have some time for fun and leisure after 15 or so hours of work. Sometimes the analysts have to finish drafts of M&A materials and have them send it out and then answer more e-mails.
The starting salary for the analysts is over 25 lakhs per year. This is the fixed pay and there’s a bonus which can be anywhere from 20% to 70% of the basic pay. One can even get up to 100% of the basic, depending on the market conditions.
