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Hey guys. Though still far in the future, I'm interested in majoring in finance during college partly because of the high income. However, the numbers for starting salaries that I've seen range from 40k to 200k. I was wondering if anyone here who works in finance could tell me how much a college graduate who majored in finance makes as a starting salary.
Well, I work in finance. It depends what country you live in and who you work for. I work for the Canadian federal government and starting wage is kind of crap for finance personnel when compared with people in other departments of the CDN federal government. Starting wage for finance for us is $44,000.00, but that's about to change as our old contract expired in June 2007 and we're working towards a new one. Don't know what the increase would be, but hopefully, it'll be at least $5,000 more per year.
My friend majored in finance and couldn't get a job until a year later after he worked in a brokerage firm. Now he works for Dell. Yearly is $44000.
ugh, i was doing finance before. don't think i can deal with it so i changed my major.
No way can someone make 200k out of college in finance unless they're some kind of prodigy.
This is what I know from my friends in or going to investiment banks, which I think would be the top of the finance food chain (Goldman, Lehman, Morgan Stanley, etc):
around 65k starting
Bonuses probably bring you over 100k easily
80 hour week bring the hourly rate to pretty low, lol.
Go to a website called vault.com, they give good estimate of what each job makes and what it's like. It's worth it for to pay for membership if you really care.
It's too early to think you're gonna be in finance if you're not in college yet. If you really want to make money, be a physicist/econ major, traders make a lot more than finance people. One thing you should know is, nothing comes for free, and high paying jobs burn out a lot of people.
Still 100k starting is very good. I've seen charts that state that investment bankers with 10 years of experience and MBA's can get $1 mil a year from salary alone.Quote:
Originally Posted by raywang
Right now because of greed leading to the mortgage meltdown and the general bad state of the economy, the finance field is really crappy. I am looking for a job, and even a nonpaid internship now, and I find it really hard. I keep hearing about this company and that company laying off people left and right.
Agree - hence i got my MS in Accountancy!Quote:
Originally Posted by flyingfox2002
you'll need to be working for an investment bank to be earning 6 digits first year out. Most of that doesn't come from your salary it's bonuses too. E.g graduate salary might be $60k, but the bonus might be $40k. And the large investment banks are the ones able to give those big bonuses.
from 30k to 40k......Quote:
Originally Posted by sarakoth
I'm about to enter my senior year of undergraduate business school and I'm in NYC now for an investment banking internship, here's some information that'll hopefully be useful to you.
The only jobs I considered in finance are investment banking and corporate finance. These actually range quite a bit in salary, i-banking being at the top and corp-fin stuck at the bottom.
Investment banking, if you go to a "bulge bracket" firm, such as Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, etc, you can expect a starting salary of ~70k with a bonus that'll put you around 100k the first year. This is the best case scenario.
There's also boutique banks, which are much much smaller, and you can expect anywhere from 60-100k.
The main thing here is that for all normal investment banks, you will most likely work over 100 hours a week. Assuming 50 wk year, (100k $)/(5k hrs) is 20$/hr. The point is that if you're good enough and stick around in banking, you'll make 7 figures in your mid-30's.
In between i-banking and corp-fin is investment management, private equity, etc. The salary here varies greatly, someone suggested www.vault.com already, please take a look there at specific firms.
At the bottom of finance is corp-fin. You work 40 hr weeks (maybe a little more depending on how busy), and starting salary tops off at 60k if I remember correctly. Expect around 50k.
Another thing to remember here is job risk. Goldman Sachs, the #1 investment bank, just laid off 100% of its first-year analyst class because the market is horrible. The other bulge-bracket banks are doing similar things. So investment banking, at least starting out, is much more risky than corp-fin.
It's a ton of info to digest, but feel free to ask questions.
Uh yeah, do you have any job leads you can help me out with? LOL
Just kidding.
The finance market in the US, and the overall economy, is terrible now.
I have a job interview tomorrow. I'll see. Probably gonna be competing with experienced laid off workers. Grrrr. The fellow finance majors who graduated with me 2 months ago are almost all still looking. I am not too crazy about the company I am interviewing for tomorrow cuz of stuff I found out googling it, but beggars can't be choosers.
Accountancy majors seem to be doing fairly well. Most did find something.
Quants are a different animal, and often limited in their growth potential in an i-bank. At some point they need to demonstrate more than pure mathematical ability to get to the next stage.Quote:
Originally Posted by raywang
I've heard that the ridiculous hours only apply to analysts who are just starting out.Quote:
Originally Posted by Leontief
getting job in a finance company is really good and salary is great
i googled the US market for my job and it says
Salary: Median—$72,040 per year
Employment Outlook: Poor
I'm glad I'm in Singapore. Tis must be quite sad if thats how much US is willing to pay....:(
As what some has indicated, it is the type of finance jobs which will decide the pay. Based on my friends' profile, e.g. if you are a consumer banking manager, you will possibly earn $50k-$70k Sing dollar.
If you are a FX trader, you can possibly earn 1/2 a million Sing dollar a year.
If you are a hedge fund manager, you can possibly earn $200k Sing dollar a year.
in aus it depends what area you go into. if you go into the banking sector of a major IB you can be offered between $80-120k starting salary. 100 hours a week though.