Lets talk about jobs in finance

[Anonymous]

This is sort of a s/o of the lawyer partner thread where some finance peeps came in and started dropping big bonus #s. I want to hear more about this! lol. If you work in finance, what do you do? Geographically, where are you located? What kinds of bonuses do you receive? Do you like the work? Did you have to start out working the crazy hours one hears about on Wall Street as a new grad?

Wives feel free to answer for your husbands (I feel like we will get more responses this way, lol).

[Anonymous]

If you're interested in this topic generally, these articles may be of interest to you.


Interview with a former Wall Street trader and why he left banking:

“You can feel like making $800,000 is almost like living in poverty."

http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2016/07/sam-polk-wall-street/492101/



Finance Is Ruining America

In Greenwich, Darien, and New Canaan, Connecticut, bankers are earning astonishing amounts. Does that have anything to do with the poverty in Bridgeport, just a few exits away?

http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2016/09/fairfield-county/501215/

[Anonymous]

I am probably not the finance person you had in mind (nowhere near law partner income). I was in the mortgage business (I started as a loan processor- eventually working my way up to manager and loan officer). When I started (in the late 90's) I was making around $30K. At my peak, I was making about $200K a year (working for one of the largest banks in the Nation). I worked a lot of hour (usually 10 a day plus weekends). Evenings were a must (that is when most people who worked were available to talk). Daytime was a must (that is when I worked with my staff to submit the loans, documentation and to resolve issues.) Money was great AND I had a great reputation, but after about 10 years, I realized I didn't want to keep the pace up, that living my life on my terms was more important to me than money.

I now work for the federal government in a housing related field in which I have a more normalized schedule and I am able to telework full time. I am a GS-14 - so my pay is a little more than half what I was making when I left. I don't work any weekends and no late nights. I am off by 4:30 -5:00 each day and daycare is 5 minutes from the house. I feel like I won the lottery.

[Anonymous]

“You can feel like making $800,000 is almost like living in poverty."

Ok yes, this sounds good! WHY did my stupid self decide to go to law school?? Why?!

[Anonymous]

Female here. I work as an equity portfolio manager, which means that I have funds that I manage and am ultimately responsible for. My base salary is $200k and my bonus can vary from 0 - a little over 7 figures? I only cracked the 1 mil mark once, a few years ago. Typically, over the past ten years, my bonus has been in the 450-750k range. Last year I made around 800k all in.

I do like the work. I've never worked on Wall Street, so maybe that's why I've never had to work the crazy hours you hear about. There is no male "locker room" culture at my firm. The men are respectful to the women and, to their credit, they do work hard to retain female employees at every level. I live in a small city (not DC) and work around 50-55 hours a week. My commute is nothing to complain about. It's basically a career that I fell into by accident. Never set out to make this kind of money. Never knew it was possible. And no, I don't feel "poor" making 800k but I also don't live in Manhattan nor do I have children.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Female here. I work as an equity portfolio manager, which means that I have funds that I manage and am ultimately responsible for. My base salary is $200k and my bonus can vary from 0 - a little over 7 figures? I only cracked the 1 mil mark once, a few years ago. Typically, over the past ten years, my bonus has been in the 450-750k range. Last year I made around 800k all in.

I do like the work. I've never worked on Wall Street, so maybe that's why I've never had to work the crazy hours you hear about. There is no male "locker room" culture at my firm. The men are respectful to the women and, to their credit, they do work hard to retain female employees at every level. I live in a small city (not DC) and work around 50-55 hours a week. My commute is nothing to complain about. It's basically a career that I fell into by accident. Never set out to make this kind of money. Never knew it was possible. And no, I don't feel "poor" making 800k but I also don't live in Manhattan nor do I have children.

PSA folks, it is not easy to become a portfolio manager- in fact, this is probably one of the most coveted titles in the immensely broad umbrella that is "finance" - hence this poster's salary and exorbitant bonuses.

[Anonymous]

So much of this is relative. I started working for GS out of college and remember being PISSED when I made $200K at 22 years old. Like royally mad, because all my friends were making $300+. Never mind that most of my college friends were making $50K - that didn't matter. The relevant comparison set wasn't them, it was peers at other orgs. And in the world of finance, the ultimate measure of your self worth is your income.

The same has proven true since (I left finance). I now make "only" $400K or so - and have to constantly remind myself that it isn't normal. You end up friends with people in similar jobs and industries, so you completely forget that you live in a total microcosm.

Also, the hours are fucking god awful. Relationships become sex in a bathroom because when the fuck else are you gonna find time? Also, depending on where you are, drugs are rampant. I've had more than one friend leave because they just were getting out of control.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So much of this is relative. I started working for GS out of college and remember being PISSED when I made $200K at 22 years old. Like royally mad, because all my friends were making $300+. Never mind that most of my college friends were making $50K - that didn't matter. The relevant comparison set wasn't them, it was peers at other orgs. And in the world of finance, the ultimate measure of your self worth is your income.

The same has proven true since (I left finance). I now make "only" $400K or so - and have to constantly remind myself that it isn't normal. You end up friends with people in similar jobs and industries, so you completely forget that you live in a total microcosm.

Also, the hours are fucking god awful. Relationships become sex in a bathroom because when the fuck else are you gonna find time? Also, depending on where you are, drugs are rampant. I've had more than one friend leave because they just were getting out of control.

I also had a friend working in finance who developed a drug problem so severe he had to leave NYC and move upstate with his parents.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:“You can feel like making $800,000 is almost like living in poverty."

Ok yes, this sounds good! WHY did my stupid self decide to go to law school?? Why?!

because you were probably terrible in math.

a parody, but has a nugget of truth from 10 years ago (pre-financial crisis):

http://www.leveragedsellout.com/2006/08/biglaw-bigschmaw/

It’s on nights like tonight that I realize things could have been a lot worse. It’s on nights like tonight when I’m dip spitting into a VOSS bottle (a definitive piece of product design) at 2:30 AM, wishing that there weren’t such a large gap between the bathroom stall and the stall door that I realize that as tough as work is, I could have definitely ended up in much a shittier situation. For example, I could have been a Corporate Lawyer.

This thought is usually cemented when I get an email from my boy Andy.

From: [e-mail]
To: logan.olsen@
omg…killself.

And I oh so cheekily respond.

From: logan.olsen@
To: [e-mail]
BigLaw, baby?

Which usually elicits something like:

From: [e-mail]
To: logan.olsen@
biglaw, bigschmaw, motherfucker. more like big dick up my ass.

Tee-hee. Ah, call me a jerk for reaping such pleasure out of the pain of a friend, but whatever. I suppose I do feel bad for Andy sometimes, but mostly I just feel good I’m not him.

Andy’s story is a real tearjerker: Andy actually originally wanted to be in finance. Rather, Andy was obsessed with finance. We went to Princeton together, and he interviewed for banking even more enthusiastically than any of the rest of us. I can still picture that overeager fuck scampering around campus to 13 interviews a day in his suit carrying his embossed little “Princeton” folder—a folder full of 2 resumes printed on 24 lb. linen paper, some Lehman dude’s business card, and a dream.

And a dream it would remain. Because Andy is, as it were, not the most “analytical” cat. He seemed to articulate his finance fetish eloquently enough to nail all his fit interviews, but he always got tripped up on some simple formula or calculation in the technical part. I swear that dude doesn’t even understand the concept of debt.

I told him: “It’s just like that time we securitized $3000 of your debt to pay off all that cash you owed to Anthony for adderall. You issued us bonds and paid us a coupon rate based on your rating, Andy.” We made out like bandits on that deal (we rated him CCC even though he obvs was more of a BAABaa because his Dad’s mad opulent), and I still don’t think he’s grasped the concept.

Net-net, Andy didn’t get a job in banking, and he was devastated. This was a guy that claims to have made a fake pitch book in 4th grade for the IPO of a snap bracelet company. This was the same guy that spent 3 months courting a black chick with the last name Ranieri because he thought “there was a chance she’s related.”

I thought Andy was going to drive up to Cornell and jump off of a gorge when he didn’t get any offers. And if he had, who would have been brave enough to follow him up to that hybrid-state-school, Ivy League-dregs-wilderness to stop him? Not me, no way.

So we kind of just let him simmer for a little while. We left him alone to come to terms with his newfound mediocrity. And a few weeks post-tragedy, Andy seemed to accept his fate. He must have chilled out with some classic Dave because he really seemed to want to make the “Best of What’s Around ” (epic track). We were all out drinking one night, and he informed us:

“Guys…after deep deliberation, I’ve decided that what was originally Plan B will now be promoted to Plan A status. What I had originally thought was suboptimal, I have now deemed hyper-optimal,” and he paused dramatically, allowing us to prepare for his revelation.

“I’ve decided that I’m going to be a big time corporate lawyer!!! BigLaw, baby. BigLaw!!””

He genuinely seemed stoked about it! Someone started a slow clap, but it faded out quickly. And then we all just stared at him and shook our heads slowly in disbelief. A passerby shouted encouragingly, “Yeah! Go get ‘em Matlock!” And that was that.

So Andy took the LSATs and was apparently much more “logical” than “quantitative.” Or maybe Kaplan is actually worth the $1k they charge to teach you to draw 6 dudes sitting around a circular table jerking each other off, because he managed to scrounge up a 168.

Andy, Jeff, Paulos, Shane, Samir, and Rex are all biglawyers. There are exactly 6 chairs evenly spaced around a circular table. The chairs are numbered 1 through 6, with successively numbered chairs next to each other and chair 1 next to chair 6. Each chair is occupied by exactly one of the biglawyers. The following conditions apply:

Rex sits immediately next to Shane.
Jeff sits immediately next to Paulos, Shane or both.
Andy does not sit immediately next to Paulos.
If Samir sits immediately next to Rex, Samir does not sit immediately next to Paulos.

Which one of the following seating arrangements of the six biglawyers in chairs 1 through 6 would NOT violate the stated conditions?

A. Andy, Rex, Shane, Paulos, Samir, Jeff
B. Andy, Jeff, Paulos, Samir, Rex, Shane
C. Andy, Samir, Rex, Shane, Jeff, Paulos
D. Andy, Shane, Jeff, Samir, Paulos, Rex
E. Douchebag, douchebag, douchebag, douchebag, douchebag, douchebag.

And then Andy got into Law School. I won’t say which, but he got into one of the Top 14 (yes, Law is indeed that elite that 14 schools are considered prestigious). The story wraps up that Andy managed to rock out amongst the rejects, make law review, and land a highly sought-after position at the firm Sullivan Cromwell, about as close to the M&A world that he so desperately wanted to be a part of without being an outsourced Indian PowerPoint drone (perchance the better choice?).

Note: Sullivan Cromwell is a “V5” firm. Law is apparently so pure-breed that they’ve gone with TheVault.com as their official prestige benchmark.

This leads us to now, when Andy is working the hours of some 1st year banking analyst for less pay, presumably making someone’s logo on a tombstone read 14pt Helvetica instead of 12pt and still scratching his head and feigning comprehension of the “complex” underlying calculations.

Poor Andy. He used to want to run a hedge fund, now all he can hope for is to be In-House Counsel. He used to want to deck himself out in the cutting edge finely tailored business apparel, but now he’s bound for a closet full of golf shirts and tassel-y shoes. Andy used to want to be in the heat of things, sealing deals and wooing clients, but now he’s destined to be support staff.

Holla back, office?

Heart wrenching, but I guess someone’s gotta be in the marching band; some folks just aren’t meant to be Varsity starters. It’s around this time that I pull out my dip, cross myself and thank God I’m one of His selected few. It’s also around this time that I realize I’m going to have to stay at work for another 2 hours. Eh, whatever, it’s comforting to know that at least there’s an Andy out there somewhere waiting up to legalize whatever bullshit document I send him.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Female here. I work as an equity portfolio manager, which means that I have funds that I manage and am ultimately responsible for. My base salary is $200k and my bonus can vary from 0 - a little over 7 figures? I only cracked the 1 mil mark once, a few years ago. Typically, over the past ten years, my bonus has been in the 450-750k range. Last year I made around 800k all in.

I do like the work. I've never worked on Wall Street, so maybe that's why I've never had to work the crazy hours you hear about. There is no male "locker room" culture at my firm. The men are respectful to the women and, to their credit, they do work hard to retain female employees at every level. I live in a small city (not DC) and work around 50-55 hours a week. My commute is nothing to complain about. It's basically a career that I fell into by accident. Never set out to make this kind of money. Never knew it was possible. And no, I don't feel "poor" making 800k but I also don't live in Manhattan nor do I have children.

PSA folks, it is not easy to become a portfolio manager- in fact, this is probably one of the most coveted titles in the immensely broad umbrella that is "finance" - hence this poster's salary and exorbitant bonuses.

being a PM and running money is one of the best jobs in finance - agreed. It's also super stressful even if the hours aren't 'bad' because you are always worried about your alpha.

[Anonymous]

Wharton undergrad. I was making 400K by age 25 in NYC. Now I clear 2 million a year. Longish hours.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Wharton undergrad. I was making 400K by age 25 in NYC. Now I clear 2 million a year. Longish hours.

Lol ok. This is very rare. Most first year analysts make less than 100k with a 25k or so bonus. Even four years in, very very few salaries above 200k. Bonuses are probably closer to the 50-100k range than what's discussed here. Even at bulge brackets.

[Anonymous]

http://wallstreetplayboys.com/investment-banking-compensation-2015/

Enjoy. Still more than biglaw! But don't listen to the troll posters above. It's also harder to land a gig at a large bank than a biglaw firm.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wharton undergrad. I was making 400K by age 25 in NYC. Now I clear 2 million a year. Longish hours.

Lol ok. This is very rare. Most first year analysts make less than 100k with a 25k or so bonus. Even four years in, very very few salaries above 200k. Bonuses are probably closer to the 50-100k range than what's discussed here. Even at bulge brackets.

The thing is, people do have these jobs. They exist. I don't know why you assume the above poster is a troll necessarily.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wharton undergrad. I was making 400K by age 25 in NYC. Now I clear 2 million a year. Longish hours.

Lol ok. This is very rare. Most first year analysts make less than 100k with a 25k or so bonus. Even four years in, very very few salaries above 200k. Bonuses are probably closer to the 50-100k range than what's discussed here. Even at bulge brackets.

The thing is, people do have these jobs. They exist. I don't know why you assume the above poster is a troll necessarily.

Because the odds of them posting on a DC Mommy forum are very low.