Playing strategic catch-up

– AMObserver, March 31, 2025.

Larger bulge-bracket banks and many elite boutique investment firms begin their interview processes for “rising senior” summer internships in the spring of sophomore year—nearly 18 months before the internship starts. They typically extend offers by May of sophomore year.

That said, some investment banking internships remain available in the summer before junior year or into the early fall. A number of regional and boutique investment banks don’t post internship opportunities until the early fall of junior year.

To secure a full-time banking analyst position, completing one of these summer internships is critical. Nearly all full-time, post-college investment banking program analyst roles are filled by candidates who went through the firms’ respective summer internship programs. While a few private equity firms hire directly from undergraduate programs, they prioritize candidates with investment banking summer experience.

Once the fall semester of junior year ends, the opportunity to secure an analyst role at an investment bank, and therefore an associate role at a private equity firm, is basically over. However, alternative paths for the balance of junior year and into senior year are still possible, though they are much more limited. For example, joining roles such as equity research, capital markets, or financing groups at investment banks can eventually lead to the buyside. For example, roles in equity research, capital markets, or financing groups at investment banks can eventually lead to the buyside. Other related positions, such as operations, marketing/IR, and trade support, may offer a pathway into investment banking.

Some students also pursue positions in accounting/valuation at a Big 4 firm, in industry/corporate finance, or at premier strategy consulting firms. These roles can serve as stepping stones to investment banking and the buyside.

Graduate school, such as an MBA or a master’s degree in quantitative fields, can help relaunch a career trajectory for those aiming to enter investment banking and the buyside. Certifications like the Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) designation are also valuable, particularly for hedge fund analyst roles.

Meanwhile, many banks have expanded their campus recruiting beyond Ivy League and “Top 20” national universities/colleges, although these schools still fill about 80% of analyst hires. A recent AMObserver survey revealed that the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School led the way for top investment banking analyst roles recently secured in New York City, followed closely by NYU’s Stern School of Business, which performed nearly on par with Wharton.

Students from other top-ranked business programs have also succeeded in landing analyst roles, including those from Indiana University’s Kelley School of Business, The University of Texas at Austin’s McCombs School of Business, UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business, the University of Michigan Ross School of Business, and the University of Wisconsin’s Madison School of Business.

Students from schools such as the University of Florida, Florida State University, Middlebury College, Texas A&M University, and the University of Connecticut also secured investment banking analyst positions. These students excelled academically and majored in business or finance.

Finally, students from international business programs, including The London School of Economics (UK), Queen’s University Smith School of Business (Canada), and Western University’s Ivey Business School (Canada), have also made their mark in top investment banking roles.

READ PART 1: How College Sophomores Land Lucrative Back-to-Back Finance Jobs upon Graduation (Article 1 of 3)

READ PART 2: How to Navigate Buyside Hiring from College Move-In Day through Sophomore Year

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The standard and alternate journeys to the buyside

– AMObserver, UPDATED March 31, 2025.

Long gone are the days of The Graduate, when a 21-year old recent college graduate, living at home and drifting through life on an inflatable pool chaise, could avoid making career decisions in college and still expect to land a great job.

For undergraduates eyeing an investment career at a buyside firm (private equity and debt firms, hedge funds), academic performance is essential, and a two-year stint in investment banking (the sellside) is by far the most likely first step right after college. But if you haven’t completed at least two very relevant internships while in college—one during or in the summer after your sophomore year and another during the critical summer after your junior year—you’ll likely miss the boat on investment banking and subsequent buyside opportunities.

And barring a great personal connection in finance or identity traits that appeal to investment firms, there are few shortcuts or work-arounds left on the modern buyside career path. The old “Gentleman’s C”—the aspirational grade needed to land a top job without seeming like an overly focused academic grind—was reset to a B+ until about a decade ago. It has since settled on the “Gentleperson’s A-” as an absolute minimum for those first four or five college semesters before landing pivotal internships.

Aiming for a post-college investment career requires a well-planned roadmap that begins early—often right after high school graduation. On this count, U.S. universities are increasingly resembling their European counterparts, where students typically know their intended career path and focus of study before stepping on campus. Additionally, U.S. colleges are seeing a well-documented shift toward pre-professional majors over liberal arts degrees, with humanities programs declining by over 30% in the past decade.

AMObserver data shows that a greater number of college students pursuing business and economics majors are seeking finance-related internships year-round, starting in their first year of college, instead of relying solely on the single-season summer internship model, as they build their experience and credentials. This more evenly blended classroom-to-professional work balance, embedded in the curricula and graduation requirements of a relatively small but growing number of cooperative education (“co-op”) universities, is catching on among students throughout the country eager to create a competitive edge as they pursue their post-college buyside goals.

Below are key steps and timelines for students focused on the most direct buyside path.

1^st Year College Students: Grasping the Two-Year Finish Line

As a first-year student, it’s essential to familiarize yourself with recruiting events aimed at sophomores and juniors. Many firms begin their outreach early, even to first-year students, through employer information sessions, coffee chats, and “Insight Days”—events designed to introduce students to firms and help them start building relationships.

It’s also important to recognize that the typical four-year college timeline is double the time it takes to secure (or forgo) a seat at a buyside firm.

Top academic performance and securing valuable internships during the first two years of college are the key ingredients for landing at a top-tier buyside firm two years after graduation.

Interviews for the most well-known investment banking or investment management rising senior internships can start as early as the spring semester of sophomore year—almost 1.5 years before that internship begins. Most other interviewing processes will be in their final stretch in the summer after sophomore year or early that fall—exactly two years from the start of your life as a college student.

Without the critical summer internship after junior year, the path to the buyside can easily stall since most full-time post-college investment banking analyst positions are reserved for return offerees from summer internships. Almost all subsequent first year private equity and credit associate roles are filled by those who’ve successfully completed a two-year investment banking analyst program.

By the second semester of one’s first year in college, students in business programs will already be positioning themselves for internships during their sophomore and junior years.

Students targeting the buyside typically major in finance or economics, often with a math or computer science minor. While a perfect GPA isn’t necessary, you’ll need to maintain at least that “Gentleperson’s A-” to remain competitive for these opportunities.

The first year of college is the last time you won’t be expected to have a business-related internship. Securing an internship at a bulge-bracket investment bank or major asset manager in the summer before sophomore year is primarily based on exceptional personal connections, as many large firms don’t offer formal internship programs for first years or sophomores. However, opportunities at boutique firms—especially in regional markets—are more accessible.

Students should start to explore internships year-round—fall, winter, spring, and summer—along with early insight programs at large and small firms. Several banks and investment firms also offer internships for students deemed to increase these firms’ diversity.

While summer internships remain the most important bridge to the most sought-after full-time jobs, internships in all four seasons have grown in both popularity and significance. These year-round internship opportunities offer valuable experience and help students compete for those top summer positions after their junior year.

Those who landed finance internships in the summer after their freshman year recommend persistence, cold calling, and focusing on smaller, regional boutique firms. It’s also strongly advised that applicants review their online footprint mindful that employers will monitor social media as part of their vetting process.

Bigger picture, one’s first year in college is also an important time to implement what will be a key life lesson: Peer learning and lateral networking—especially with classmates further along in their college journey or already in their full-time careers—can offer insights and opportunities just as valuable as those from professors or career services teams.

This is especially true at schools with strong undergraduate business classes or programs, where fellow classmates have already led their high school investment clubs, managed real or mock investment portfolios, or participated in high school stock and economics competitions such as The Wharton Global High School Investment Competition and The Federal Reserve System’s High School Fed Challenge.

Some may also have attended high schools with robust pre-professional programs, designed in collaboration with industry experts, to provide their students with hands-on experience and insight into their future fields.

Finally, one should not rely solely on one’s own college for this outreach. High school alma maters and affinity-based networks can be just as meaningful.

Sophomore Year: The Internships

As students return to campus for their sophomore year, it’s crucial to begin applying for both sophomore and junior summer internships. This is when many middle-market, independent boutique, and bulge-bracket investment banking firms make their summer analyst offers.

By sophomore year, some large private equity firms start targeting students at select schools, advising them to “contact us once you receive your investment banking internship offer.” However, these firms typically won’t hire sophomores until they have completed their two-year investment banking analyst programs. Some private equity firms onboard a smaller cohort of analysts for jobs starting directly after college; almost all such hires will have completed a summer investment banking internship.

A sophomore summer investment banking or asset management internship provides relevant experience, showcases one’s ability and grit to secure competitive positions, and builds a network of industry contacts. Relevant internships—no matter the season—strengthen resumes and demonstrate early and proactive interest in the field.

Buyside professionals who recently secured private equity associate roles after two years as investment banking analysts acknowledge that landing a top-tier investment banking or buyside internship between sophomore and junior year is tough, especially without major connections. While large firms may offer positions for sophomores, not having a sophomore-year investment banking internship isn’t a dealbreaker. What’s most important is securing a finance-related internship that positions you well for future interviews.

Meanwhile, Excel—still the lingua franca of the finance world—is essential, along with learning relevant computer programming languages, especially those used to organize large data sets.

For interview preparation, online resources and the collective experience of qualified peers, alumni, and career services personnel, are essential. These same resources can help ensure that you present your extracurricular and internship experiences effectively to potential employers, while adhering to resume best practices for tone, content, format, grammar, and punctuation.

Originally published November 18 , 2024.

READ PART 1: How College Sophomores Land Lucrative Back-to-Back Finance Jobs upon Graduation (Article 1 of 3)

READ PART 3: Junior and Senior Year Alternate Paths to the Investment Buyside 

Subscribe to AMObserver Newsletter for talent insights, career advice, and featured jobs

Contact us for hiring needs and career advisory services

The race for jobs that begins right after college move-in day

– AMObserver, UPDATED March 31, 2025.

Every summer, a select group of college graduates embarks on their first full-time jobs at prestigious investment banks. But before they even settle into their analyst program desks, many of them have already secured their second job at another firm—one that won’t start for another two years. The most recent graduating crop will receive and accept their second offers at private equity and credit firms within about a month of tossing their graduation caps without ever having worked a day in a full-time role.

While most college juniors and seniors are still figuring out their post-college plans and tidying up their resumes, these investment banking hires already charted a career path in their first or second year of school and effectively locked in two consecutive jobs before the end of summer after sophomore year. They understood that while sophomore year is the half-way mark of their undergraduate journey, it’s the actual finish line for most who pursue a sellside investment banking analyst spot and want a buyside associate offer at a private equity or private credit firm immediately after completing their banking program.

Class of 2025 graduates, for example, will have lined up two consecutive two-year jobs: one as entry-level analysts in investment banking (2025-2027), followed by a future-dated associate position (2027-2029) at a private equity or credit manager. Some even plan to fast-track their careers by then skipping the once-essential MBA and jumping straight into more senior roles at their buyside employer in the Fall of 2029.

While compensation varies by firm, by team, and individual performance, these hires can expect to earn around $1.0 to $1.2 million over the next four years, based on most recent years’ compensation data. Their private equity or credit pay stubs will account for approximately two-thirds of their total income during this four-year period.

Every year, over 10,000 well-qualified college seniors from an expanding list of target undergraduate schools compete for these concurrent employment offers. Yet, only a few hundred succeed. Those who do typically receive ‘exploding’ deadline offers from their prospective second employers, often requiring them to accept the position within 24 hours.

Around 20 private equity and credit firms engage in this talent rush, securing future hires after their two-year investment banking stints and bypassing the need to train recruits from scratch. Most of these firms are industry giants like Blackstone, KKR, Carlyle, and Apollo, alongside upper middle-market private equity funds handling up to billion-dollar business transactions. Even the largest among them employee no more than 1,000 full-time investment professionals.

While a handful of the largest hedge funds, including Point72 Asset Management and Citadel, have built their own internship and full-time investment analyst training academies, hedge funds don’t extend offers to candidates years in advance, and follow a ‘just-in-time’ full-time hiring model, recruiting based on actual rather than expected need, typically months—not years—before employment start dates.

A few of the large PE firms also incorporate this model for a portion of their analyst hires and train this cohort themselves. These candidates have typically worked at least one summer internship at an investment bank before landing at a PE firm right after college graduation.

The appeal of transitioning from the service-provider sellside of investment banking—where professionals pitch, represent and advise clients on their investment and finance needs—to the client buyside of asset management, hasn’t waned. It’s about more than just the perceived pecking-order prestige of being the deep-pocketed client versus advising the client for a fee; it’s about making actual investment decisions and taking investment control, and of course, potentially reaping extraordinary financial rewards.

Buy-side professionals often see seven-figure compensation by their 30s, and for those who reach the senior partner level, eight-figure paydays aren’t uncommon. While today’s private equity associate roles often feel like an extension of investment banking—or “Banking 2.0”—with a heavy focus on deal processes and financial modeling, many view the work as a step up in terms of decision-making power and responsibility.

Lifestyle also plays a role. While office hours at some investment banks can log 80-100+ per week during peak deal activity, private equity and credit firms demand fewer hours, with associates averaging 60-80 hours per week. For many, the prospect of fewer grueling hours and transitioning away from an “on-call 24/7” work culture are significant incentives to make the leap.

Moreover, these candidates generally view private equity and credit as having relatively stable career paths, thanks to long-term capital commitments from public and private capital allocators, as well as low staff turnover. This also means fewer opportunities to join these firms, which promote heavily from within, at more senior investment levels.

The road to securing a private equity or credit associate offer remains largely unchanged. With rare exception, it still requires a couple of years of full-time investment banking analyst experience, ideally at major firms like Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, or J.P. Morgan, or at elite boutiques like Lazard, Centerview Partners, or PJT Partners. Some candidates hail from middle-market banks like Houlihan Lokey and Jefferies, or from large international institutions like Nomura and HSBC.

Receiving a full-time investment banking offer still almost always requires a “rising senior” summer internship at an investment bank between one’s junior and senior year of college. Most full-time analyst roles are extended to strong-performing interns within weeks of completing a firm’s 10-12 week summer programs. Many of these successful candidates will typically have worked in a finance or business-related internship in their sophomore or “rising junior” year.

What has changed dramatically is the timeline. First-year college students are now caught off guard by the ever-accelerating starting point requirements for this career path, while graduating seniors and their future banking managers are startled by aggressive buyside hiring cycles.

Private equity and debt firms now snap up talent earlier than ever, locking in associate talent 25 months in advance of a job start date—often before their banking analyst training even kicks off. A few bulge-bracket banks are reportedly beginning to counter these aggressive recruitment strategies. In 2024, JPMorgan Chase & Co. indicated that accepting future-dated buyside offers “could result in us reconsidering the status of your employment.”

Meanwhile, these days there are many more ‘four-season’ internship options in the first half of college to grab the attention of investment bank hiring managers for the mission-critical rising senior summer internship between junior and senior year.

And students do manage to secure buyside investment roles without having landed that summer internship or capitalized on that initial wave of buyside recruiting immediately after college graduation.

But competition is fiercer than ever. With many investment banks having expanded their recruiting efforts to include more schools and with the allure of private equity growing—driven by an associate path that may now include carried interest (a share in firm profits) and bypassing the traditional MBA—securing a spot on this career track has become an increasingly competitive battle among top candidates.

Originally published September 30, 2024.

READ PART 2: How to Navigate Buyside Hiring from College Move-In Day through Sophomore Year

READ PART 3: Junior and Senior Year Alternate Paths to the Investment Buyside

Subscribe to AMObserver Newsletter for talent insights, career advice, and featured jobs

Contact us for hiring needs and career advisory services