Non-target school#77 of 100
Ohio State University investment banking placement: is it a target school?
Ohio State University is a non-target school for investment banking by our count. It ranks #77 of the 100 schools we measure: 100 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 853 profiles that include an investment banking job title.
- Rank
- #77of 100 schools
- At 18 top banks, 2015+
- 10077% graduated 2018+
- At the elite five
- 4343% of the top-bank total
- IB alumni network
- 853#49 by profiles
- Per 1,000 undergrads
- 18.7#89 per capita
- US-based
- 87%738 profiles
Is Ohio State a target school for investment banking?
The verdict, from the data853 investment banking profiles put Ohio State at #49 by raw count, twenty-eight places ahead of its #77 headline rank, and 100 of those alumni have worked as investment banking analysts at the 18 top banks since the 2013 class. That top-bank count ranks #66, eleven places ahead of the headline as well. The sheer scale of the banking alumni network is the school's clearest asset here.
The offsetting number is the per-student leg of the blend: 45,728 undergrads sit behind every count here, and even the broad network thins to 18.7 profiles per 1,000 undergraduates against a 97.8 median, a per-capita rank of #89. Hedge funds are a genuine strength, ranking #22 with 106 profiles, or 12 per 100 IB profiles. The elite five took 43 of the 100 top-bank analysts, a 43 percent share.
Low density is not a technicality; it describes how many classmates compete for the same introductions, and 77 percent of the top-bank cohort graduated in 2018 or later, leaving the remainder further back. For a student willing to work the network rather than wait on it, an 853-profile base and 100 alumni inside the largest banks are more than enough raw material.
Ohio State investment banking placement by bank
Analysts, classes of ~2015+Ohio State University's analysts at the 18 top banks we measure, graduates of 2013 or later with investment banking analyst titles, against the elite five. Its per-bank cells are not yet measured, so the breakdown by bank is the one thing this page cannot show.
- 18All 18 top banks we measure100
- 5The elite five: Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, J.P. Morgan, Evercore, and Centerview43
By count alone Ohio State University ranks #67 of 100; the table of schools ranked nearby, below, sets that figure beside its neighbors.
Where Ohio State alumni land beyond investment banking
Alumni profiles, all yearsOhio State 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 Ohio State
Fisher Futures is the pipeline: a highly selective investment banking career development program run by the career office for more than 20 years, with Wall Street Prep modeling training, individual interview coaching and mentorship, alumni networking, visits to major financial centers, and a guided run at the summer analyst recruiting that leads to full-time seats. Beneath it sits the Investment Banking Pathway, a 15-week no-application program for second-semester freshmen and first-semester sophomores that ends in a case competition.
The career office’s 2023–24 annual report puts Fisher undergraduate starting salaries at a record $68,832 and the three-month outcome rate at 88%, up from 87%, and says Fisher Futures students who took investment banking positions averaged $106,333; that year’s cohort traveled to New York and Chicago to visit banks and private equity firms, with virtual sessions from BMO, Brown Gibbons Lang, Baird, and Guggenheim.
Buckeye Capital Investors, started in 2005, is the student-run club that teaches the mechanics of banking; its chief investment officer told the campus paper in 2015 that the goal is a pipeline to Wall Street because Ohio State is traditionally not a target for most bulge brackets, and that recent members had landed at Goldman Sachs in Los Angeles, Morgan Stanley and J.P. Morgan in New York, and William Blair in Chicago.
Forum posters say Fisher Futures places nearly everyone, through networking rather than campus recruiting, that plenty of students reach banking without it, and that the school has enough alumni and name recognition for a hard networker to break in; one student notes the same bulge-bracket offer as target-school peers at less than half the price, and a transfer who missed the program still landed a banking offer.
Our data ranks Ohio State #77 on 853 top-bank analysts, the #49 count in the country, from 45,728 undergraduates, or 18.7 per 1,000; 87% of its banking alumni network is US-based. Its per-bank cells are not yet fetched, so the neighbor table above stands in for a bank breakdown.
What Ohio State publishes about outcomes
5 figures, 2 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.
Fisher College of Business, Fisher Futures
- Years Fisher Futures has run
- more than 20
- Length of the Investment Banking Pathway
- 15 weeks
Fisher Office of Career Management, 2023–24 Annual Report (PDF)
- Fisher undergraduate average starting salary, 2023–24
- $68,832
- Undergraduate outcome success three months after graduation
- 88% (from 87%)
- Average salary of Fisher Futures students in investment banking
- $106,333
How Ohio State compares with schools ranked nearby
Analysts at 18 top banks, ~2015+Ohio State investment banking FAQ
8 questionsIs Ohio State University a target school for investment banking?
Ohio State University is a non-target school for investment banking by our count. It ranks #77 of the 100 schools we measure: 100 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 853 profiles that include an investment banking job title.
How many Ohio State alumni are analysts at the top investment banks?
100 Ohio State University alumni from the classes of roughly 2015 onward hold investment banking analyst titles alongside one of the 18 top banks we measure, the #67 count of the 100 schools ranked; 43 of them are at the elite five, Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, J.P. Morgan, Evercore, and Centerview. Its per-bank breakdown is not yet measured, so the table above compares its total with the top of the ranking.
Do banks treat Ohio State as a target school?
No; the campus banking club’s own leadership calls it not a target for most bulge brackets, and forum posters say Fisher Futures places nearly everyone through networking rather than campus recruiting. Our count ranks it #77 of 100.
What is Fisher Futures?
A selective banking program run by Fisher’s career office for more than 20 years, with Wall Street Prep training, coaching, and bank visits in New York and Chicago; its 2023–24 report says members who took banking jobs averaged $106,333.
What do Fisher undergraduates earn after graduation?
A record $68,832 average starting salary in the 2023–24 career report, with 88% placed three months after graduation.
How many Ohio State University alumni work in private equity?
383 Ohio State University alumni profiles include a private equity job title, ranking #52 of the 100 schools in our database.
How many Ohio State University alumni work in venture capital?
111 Ohio State University alumni profiles include a venture capital job title, ranking #53 of the 100 schools in our database.
How many Ohio State University alumni work in hedge fund?
106 Ohio State University alumni profiles include a hedge fund job title, ranking #22 of the 100 schools in our database.
How we counted Ohio State’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 Ohio State 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, 738 (87%) are currently based in the United States and 115 are abroad. The per-1,000 figure divides the network count by 45,728 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.
