WSO Weekly Wrap-up

February 08, 2025

Hey WSO Monkey,

We just had some amazing placements at Lazard, Centerview, BoA, Wells, and Goldman all in the last few weeks. If you haven’t checked us out yet, you can learn more about WSO Academy here.

-Patrick

Top Discussions

  1. 30Y/O Ex-IB/PE Turned Into Semi-retired Trader. Q&A - "Quick summary: STEM major from a good school. Elite BB IBD, 2.5 yrs. 2nd tier PE firm for 2.5 yrs. Quit to trade my own book..."

  2. The U.S. Sovereign Wealth Fund Is Paradise - "Lunch is catered from the White House Mess Hall. I sit next to a guy from the Pentagon’s “AI Readiness Task Force.” He assures me that investing $500M into a surveillance drone startup run by a 24-year-old Stanford dropout is critical for national security. I write “synergies?” in my notes and take a bite of my taxpayer-funded steak..."

  3. PE Firms With Good Cultures - "Bain and Berkshire tend to be the two firms people consistently reference for having slightly better cultures than most. To be clear, it's still scaled PE, not like you feel like you're working at Google, but have had close friends work at both and would generally agree they have positive things to say. Advent used to come up in those discussions a lot too, but seems like it may have gotten more group-dependent in recent years, someone else may be closer to the latest feel there."

Watch Now: The Pitchbook Evolved

Discover how leading investment banks are automating pitchbook building to cut creation time in half.

Alex Boyce, Head of Capital Solutions at Stifel, and Janik Bold, MD at Leverest, share their top tips to navigate common challenges within the industry.

In 45-minutes, discover how top firms:

  • Use automation software to gain first-mover advantage over the competition

  • Structure pitch decks that rise above others in an RFP

  • Automates manual tasks in PowerPoint and Excel to speed up the pitchbook creation process

Top Discussions (contd.)

  1. BofA’s Falloff Needs to Be Studied - "It’s not just juniors the bank is shafting, it’s everyone. MDs did not get paid the last few years either, and a ton of good MDs in the bank’s historically strong groups left. Hell the sponsors team lost like 3/4 of its seniors last year and the team all but imploded. The firm protects analysts because they’re cheap but absolutely kills its associates - is it really that hard to scrounge up an extra $30k to pay them market value? Apparently it is, because the bank is not profitable. And don’t even get me started on VP/Ds, who got shafted the most out of any level. Directors getting paid 500k is absolutely absurd, like not even bottom of the barrel ones..."

  2. The Analyst Through Associate Years Are Awful. When Does It End? - "The path to VP/Director has not gotten longer - it’s gone back to normal. People weren’t usually VPs at 27 pre-2020 unless they were a broker and just had the title externally. Promotion cycles sped up massively during the pandemic - more deals, more firms, more seats. Some of those promotions were justified as it was impossible to hold back truly talented individuals during that period. But now that the industry is right sizing, we’re just converging back to “normal”. Which means analysts and associates have to compete to get to the next level."

  3. Restructuring Consulting – Industry Outlook 2025 & Common Exit Opps - "The high-visibility, more standard path for Rx consulting is just to stay and work your way up, which isn’t very appealing to the extreme Type A personalities that want the “higher path” people in this forum talk about. However, in my opinion, it’s a very good career for those interested in the field and management consulting work—hours are better than banking, but comp diverges from banking as you get more senior, and you are not moving to buyside like PE. This is where the specialized Rx consulting players make their case to me, the top of these being BRG, Province, and M3 Partners..."

WSO Alpha: Latest Updates 📈

We uploaded the December brokerage report for those of you curious how we did.

Hot Jobs 💼

Controller - "This position is responsible for the preparation of financial statements, budgets, and forecasts; maintenance of internal controls and procedures; management of third-party audits and state tax returns; and supervision of accounting personnel..." 

Project Finance Associate - "This is a career-level role, and we expect the Project Finance Associate to grow and find new ways to impact our organization, contributing to Zanskar’s broader financial and capital allocation strategy..."

Investment Banking Analyst - “A boutique IB practice focused on MM M&A. Lean, mean, entrepreneurial team of highly motivated deal makers who all ‘punch above our weight’. While other investment banks have large teams working around the clock, we work smart in small teams, and achieve outstanding results for our clients and still get home in time to see our families. Industry generalists…“

Director of M&A - "...formed to be the best long-term home for independent companies that provide unique data, content or information focused on small but important niches and are owned and operated by founders."

Sr Discretionary Researcher / Trader - Fully Remote - "We are a discretionary, event-driven proprietary trading firm and hedge fund specialized in the digital asset space."

Research Associate (Equity Small Mid Cap) - New York, NY - "This position will support the Small/Mid-Cap Equity research team and initially be responsible for covering multiple sectors in support of current team members."

On Deck - Training 🎓

All in Eastern Standard Time

Stay Strong,
Patrick Curtis
CEO and Founder, WallStreetOasis.com

WSO Mobile App: iOS | Android

PS - We're also always looking to add resume reviewers and WSO Mentors to our team. Set your own pay (from $40/hr to up to $400/hr) to increase or decrease mentee flow. To submit an application, go here.

PPS - Think you have an interesting story? Want to share it with our podcast listeners? Hit reply and let me know!




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