Sample Day Series: Investment Banking Intern
9:30 am – Arrive to work and head straight to the break room in order to pick up a couple breakfast burritos and an OJ. Hang up my suit jacket and proceed to fist-bump my fellow interns
10:00 am – Check my email, listen to endless voicemails, and log-on Bloomberg Terminal to check the news and performance of my clients
11:25 am – Associate slams me on a couple pitches, I decide to begin with a firepower analysis for a buy-side client. The takeaway here is how much financing the company can tap into following the current deal for future M&A in the near term
12:00 pm – I text an analyst I normally hang-out with on weekends if he’d like to grab lunch. Banker favorites around midtown are Essen, Sarah’s Kitchen, and Urban Space. However, we opt for Chipotle in order to stack the new Chiptopia rewards
1:00 pm – Get back into the office and head towards my desk. Associate meets me half way, glances at his Rolex GMT and frowns. “Have you finished that model yet?”
1:20 pm – As soon as I get in my zone, a foam football smacks me in the face. It’s Thomas, a fellow intern from Equity Capital Markets – he needs help printing and binding pitch books. Having done me a solid the week before, I smile and decide to help him out (knowing full well he probably got that request hours ago and he’s spent the time browsing ties on Vineyard Vines).
3:45 pm – I’m halfway through the model and I decide to stretch. Sitting on a chair for hours on end for just two months has already inflicted damage to my spine. I bounce out of my chair, crack my back and head to the break room. My eyes latch onto a cute girl making a protein shake and just as I’m about to compliment her, I remember the harassment training from the week before and decide to just refill my coffee
5:00 pm – My model refuses to balance and I’m getting pretty frustrated. I turn over to Erin, a fellow M&A intern to see if she can spot my error. Unable to help and exacting a headache onto her as well, I’m forced to continue the search alone
7:00 pm – I’m still looking for that same error and decide to postpone the firepower analysis and work on the accretion dilution model
8:00 pm – I can hear the cockiest banker in our outfit coming down the stairs from a higher level. He’s making his routine round up to see if there are any takers to join him for expensed dinner. Erin who is obviously infatuated with him agrees to join him en route Shake Shack
10:00 pm – Having completed the remnants of the accre/dillu model from the day before, I continue to search for the problem with the firepower analysis and find out that Bloomberg didn’t extract the data from the financial statements accurately. I have to go through and manually mine the data
2:00 am – The model seems to be balancing now.. but I want to double check tomorrow when I have a clear head. I pick up my suit from the rack and call an uber. As I exit the building, I undo my tie, untuck my shirt, and let out a sigh
