Do you really work much longer hours in a front office investment banking job (eg. M&A or sales and trading) than in any other industry? The answer is yes.
While full time working hours in most industries have been steadily falling for years and are now close to an average of around 30 per week, forum website Wall Street Oasis suggests that average working hours at 33 top banks in 2019 were closer to 73 per week. Bankers really do work twice as hard as everyone else.
Wall Street Oasis’ figures for average working hours per bank are shown in the chart below. They reflect submissions from thousands of users and have not been validated by the banks concerned. WSO says working hours are significantly longer at boutique M&A firms like Perella Weinberg, Moelis & Co and Evercore than at French banks like Credit Agricole, Natixis and SocGen.
Hours are typically around the average for European investment banks, and slightly above the average for U.S. investment banks – although JPMorgan is an anomaly.
The second chart below shows the evolution of average working hours per bank (based on WSO figures) since 2017. Althouh average hours at many banks have fallen, at some large U.S. banks they appear to have been creeping up again in recent years. If you’re looking at this chart on a mobile we suggest you save it for a desktop due to problems with our chart formatting tool.
Sarah Butcher – Read more on efinancialcareers.com
