Lower semi-target school#46 of 100
Boston University investment banking placement: is it a target school?
Boston University is a lower semi-target school for investment banking by our count. It ranks #46 of the 100 schools we measure: 219 alumni list investment banking analyst titles alongside the 18 top banks from classes of roughly 2015 onward, weighted for school size, and its wider banking alumni network holds 1,661 profiles that include an investment banking job title.
- Rank
- #46of 100 schools
- At 18 top banks, 2015+
- 21978% graduated 2018+
- At the elite five
- 10749% of the top-bank total
- IB alumni network
- 1,661#28 by profiles
- Per 1,000 undergrads
- 89.0#54 per capita
- US-based
- 72%1,199 profiles
Is BU a target school for investment banking?
The verdict, from the dataBoston University's top-bank rank of #42 now sits four places above its headline #46, yet the older imbalance still shows: 1,661 investment banking profiles overall, but only 219 analysts at the 18 top banks. Of those 219, though, 107 are at the elite five, a 49 percent share that is high for the volume behind it. J.P. Morgan leads the firm counts at 52.
Density is the weak broad reading, #54 at 89 profiles per 1,000 undergraduates, just under the 97.8 median and set against 18,656 undergraduates, while network size ranks #28. The buyside network is where the school is strongest, with 185 hedge fund profiles at #10 and 973 private equity profiles at #21, or 11 and 59 per 100 IB profiles. Only 72 percent of profiles are US-based.
More than a quarter of the network reports a location outside the US, while the top-bank measure is built on analyst titles at a largely US-facing list of firms, so the two figures count overlapping but different populations. The verdict is a broad finance network whose banking core — the thing the headline now measures — is narrower than the network's size suggests.
BU investment banking placement by bank
Analysts, classes of ~2015+Boston University analysts at each of the top banks we measured — graduates of 2013 or later with investment banking analyst titles. Banks with published feeder pages link through.
- 1J.P. Morgan52
- 2Goldman Sachs38
- 3Citi25
- 4Morgan Stanley24
- 5UBS20
- 6Bank of America18
- 7Barclays16
- 8Deutsche Bank14
- 9Wells Fargo13
Banks with fewer than five matched analysts, and banks not yet measured for this school, are left off the list. Of the 219 analysts at the 18 banks, 107 (49%) are at the elite five: Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, J.P. Morgan, Evercore, and Centerview.
Where BU alumni land beyond investment banking
Alumni profiles, all yearsBoston University’s rank in each vertical we count, by the same title-phrase method. Bars show its count as a share of that ranking’s #1 school. Per 100 IB shows the network mix: profiles per 100 IB profiles.
How to recruit for investment banking from BU
Questrom’s Class of 2025 employment report, on a class of 808 with an 86% knowledge rate, shows a 99% employment rate, $87,926 mean total compensation for US jobs, 13% continuing education, and New York as the top hiring city. Financial services took 33% of graduates at $94,094 average first-year compensation, and by function investment banking was 7% at $112,850, asset management 8% at $107,210, and sales and trading 2% at $125,600; the finance concentration covers 52% of the class.
Among the 283 companies that hired the class, JPMorgan Chase is marked at five or more hires and Goldman Sachs and Deutsche Bank at two or more, with Citigroup also on the list. The Class of 2023 report, on 659 graduates, had 31% in financial services and 15% in an investment function at $98,902, with Morgan Stanley, Piper Sandler, Stifel, and PIMCO among the employers.
The BU Finance & Investment Club is the largest undergraduate organization at Questrom, managing about $1,600,000 of the university endowment in small-cap value stocks through a ladder that starts first-years as junior analysts in its investment research program. Its latest letter to alumni says the Class of 2028 secured more offers at top buy-side and sell-side institutions than any class in club history, credits pitches at Boston buy-side firms such as Manulife, and marks the first BUFC gala honoring members’ internship and full-time offers.
A March 2025 Questrom piece, republished from Poets&Quants, explains why the school built a joint finance-preparation effort between the Feld Center, faculty, and the finance clubs: recruiting begins as early as sophomore year, and the club-run modeling and Superday workshops, useful as they were, lacked the rigor a hyper-competitive industry demands.
Peak Frameworks ranks Boston University #45 of 60 and #41 by total hires, a lower semi-target with an elite-firm share of 52%, built on J.P. Morgan at 21% of placements and Goldman Sachs and Citi at 18% each, offset by a presence score of 24% that signals thin representation at many other firms.
A Questrom alumnus on the forums describes a ton of alumni across banking and decent buy-side representation for a non-target, an investment club anyone can join whose upper ranks carry a pipeline into several bulge brackets and elite boutiques, Boston buy-side firms including Bain Capital recruiting through it for a spot or two a year, and the best outcomes going to finance, accounting, and hard-science students who still network and court their professors.
Our data ranks BU #46 on 1,661 top-bank analysts, the #28 count in the country, from 18,656 undergraduates, or 89.0 per 1,000; 72% of its banking alumni network is US-based, the lowest share in this batch alongside UIUC’s 74%. The bank breakdown above shows which of the 18 measured firms hold the most BU analysts.
What BU publishes about outcomes
26 figures, 4 sourcesEvery figure below is quoted from the source named above it, as published; none is ours. Read them beside our counts, which measure a different thing: analysts matched to named banks rather than a graduating class's outcomes.
Questrom School of Business, Undergraduate Employment Report, Class of 2025 (PDF)
- Questrom Class of 2025 size
- 808
- Knowledge rate, Class of 2025
- 86%
- Employment rate, Class of 2025
- 99%
- Mean total compensation, US jobs, Class of 2025
- $87,926
- Continuing education, Class of 2025
- 13%
- Financial services share, Class of 2025
- 33%
- Financial services average first-year compensation
- $94,094
- Investment banking function share
- 7%
- Investment banking average first-year compensation
- $112,850
- Asset management function share
- 8%
- Asset management average first-year compensation
- $107,210
- Sales and trading function share
- 2%
- Sales and trading average first-year compensation
- $125,600
- Finance concentration share
- 52%
- Companies that hired the Class of 2025
- 283
Questrom School of Business, Undergraduate Employment Report, Class of 2023 (PDF)
- Questrom Class of 2023 size
- 659
- Financial services share, Class of 2023
- 31%
- Investment function share, Class of 2023
- 15%
- Investment function average first-year compensation, Class of 2023
- $98,902
BU Finance & Investment Club, About
- BU Finance & Investment Club assets
- about $1,600,000
Peak Frameworks, Boston University Investment Banking Placement
- Peak Frameworks rank
- #45 of 60
- Peak Frameworks rank by total hires
- #41
- Share of Peak-counted hires at the top firms
- 52%
- Share of Peak-counted placements at J.P. Morgan
- 21%
- Share of Peak-counted placements at Goldman Sachs and at Citi
- 18% each
- Peak Frameworks presence score
- 24%
How BU compares with schools ranked nearby
Analysts at 18 top banks, ~2015+BU investment banking FAQ
8 questionsIs Boston University a target school for investment banking?
Boston University is a lower semi-target school for investment banking by our count. It ranks #46 of the 100 schools we measure: 219 alumni list investment banking analyst titles alongside the 18 top banks from classes of roughly 2015 onward, weighted for school size, and its wider banking alumni network holds 1,661 profiles that include an investment banking job title.
Which banks hire the most BU analysts?
By our count, J.P. Morgan leads with 52 BU alumni holding investment banking analyst titles, then Goldman Sachs with 38 and Citi with 25, among graduates of 2013 or later at the 18 top banks we measure.
Do banks treat Boston University as a target school?
A non-target by forum accounts with a strong club pipeline; Peak Frameworks ranks it #45 of 60 with 52% of hires at elite firms. Our count ranks it #46 of 100, on the #28 analyst count in the country.
What share of Questrom graduates go into investment banking?
7% of the Class of 2025 by function, at $112,850 average first-year compensation, within a 33% financial services share; the Class of 2023 had 15% in investment functions.
How does the BU Finance & Investment Club help with recruiting?
It is Questrom’s largest student organization, runs about $1,600,000 of the endowment, and its latest letter says the Class of 2028 secured more offers at top buy-side and sell-side firms than any class in its history.
How many Boston University alumni work in private equity?
973 Boston University alumni profiles include a private equity job title, ranking #21 of the 100 schools in our database.
How many Boston University alumni work in venture capital?
268 Boston University alumni profiles include a venture capital job title, ranking #22 of the 100 schools in our database.
How many Boston University alumni work in hedge fund?
185 Boston University alumni profiles include a hedge fund job title, ranking #10 of the 100 schools in our database.
How we counted BU’s analysts
Counts come from People Data Labs, which aggregates public professional profiles. The headline rank is anchored on the strict measure: profiles that list Boston University in their education, a job title containing “investment banking analyst”, one of 18 named top banks as an employer, and a graduation year of 2013 or later — the analyst classes of roughly 2015 onward, deduplicated across banks. Those conditions hold on the profile rather than on a single job, so the title and the bank are usually but not provably the same role. The rank weights that count at two-thirds and the same count per 1,000 undergraduates at one-third, so school size is priced in. The elite-five figure counts analysts at Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, J.P. Morgan, Evercore, and Centerview. Data pulled 2026-10-16.
The alumni-network figure is broader: everyone who has held a title containing “investment banking” at any firm worldwide, across all years, including graduate alumni. It reads as the size of the school’s banking network rather than a single era’s placement. Of those, 1,199 (72%) are currently based in the United States and 462 are abroad. The per-1,000 figure divides the network count by 18,656 total undergraduates reported for fall 2023 in the NCES IPEDS Fall Enrollment dataset — a school-size comparison, not a placement rate for a graduating class.
