The highest paying (American) investment bank in London
It might be a slight exaggeration to say that everyone in investment banking is in it for the money, but they do spend an awfully long time comparing their… Pay packages.
Courtesy of recruitment consultancy Dartmouth Partners, we have some more information on the size of those packages - in London. The results are, frankly, quite surprising.
Based on consistent data (taking associates and VPs 1 through 3), the best paying investment bank in London is Bank of America. BofA’s bankers earned $1.80m across these six years, higher by some margin than second placed Goldman’s ($1.73m). Credit Suisse’s people got the shortest end of the stick, with total compensation reaching “just” $1.42m across those six years.
BofA’s associates are the best paid in London, with total compensation of $686k across three years, whilst Goldman had the best paid VPs, earning $1.13m across three years. Credit Suisse was worst represented across both levels, although that’s pretty expected given… You know.
As Bloomberg reported, Goldman Sachs was the highest paying investment bank for the previous period covered by Dartmouth Partners (2021). Goldman has always been prestigious, and it’s banked on that prestige to often get away with paying bankers less than competitors, but it seems Morgan Stanley has joined that particular club – it had the second worst-paid associates after Credit Suisse.
At second glance, however, the results might not be so surprising. BofA performed best compared to their rivals across 2022, and that’s either because high pay packages attract the best people – or because money on the table motivates people to work harder.
Of course, BofA isn’t entirely immune to job cuts. It’s dropped some of its investment banking team in London – although just a few dozen, as opposed to the thousands (or tens of thousands) of cuts seen elsewhere. The bank has been trying to move staff around where possible as opposed to letting them go, however.
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