Yes, it gets more difficult. They’re not going to hire someone with 8 years of full-time experience for an entry-level IB role. Other fields are a bit more flexible, but you still generally need to move quickly because it becomes more difficult to switch over time.

Hey Brian – could you elaborate on what you mean by too much experience? Is it more difficult to start a career in ER/IB/HF/AM as one gets older (I’m 30).

It’s a significant discount to IB. Compensation doesn’t really change much in the span of 2-3 years if that is your question, so the ranges here still apply. Most HF recruiting is off-cycle, meaning you need to do the legwork and outreach yourself rather than relying on headhunters. Headhunters may contacts some ER professionals for certain roles, but it’s not the same process as the IB –> PE recruitment pipeline.

There is some overlap between certain desks, but S&T is very different in most cases because it’s responsible for executing trades and selling/distributing products to clients. There’s overlap in the sense that you may do “research” in both ER and S&T, but the purpose is quite different because in ER, it used to be to encourage S&T clients to trade, and now it’s produced so that banks can charge clients directly for the research. Distressed debt is probably the area where S&T is closest to ER, but even there, it’s different because you do not trade or sell anything in ER. And there is no distressed debt ER group – maybe there’s a credit or fixed income research group that covers distressed debt.

Impossible to say because I don’t know your university, GPA, previous work experience, networking, etc.

Do you believe that a msf will help to help me get into equity research

ER does almost no on-campus / on-cycle recruiting, so a better school helps, but not as directly as it does for groups that come to campus to recruit.