Non-target school#86 of 100
UC Irvine investment banking placement: is it a target school?
UC Irvine is a non-target school for investment banking by our count. It ranks #86 of the 100 schools we measure: 59 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 606 profiles that include an investment banking job title.
- Rank
- #86of 100 schools
- At 18 top banks, 2015+
- 5973% graduated 2018+
- At the elite five
- 2644% of the top-bank total
- IB alumni network
- 606#63 by profiles
- Per 1,000 undergrads
- 20.5#87 per capita
- US-based
- 71%430 profiles
Is UCI a target school for investment banking?
The verdict, from the dataUC Irvine's 606 investment banking profiles rank #63 by raw count, but only 59 of those alumni are matched to the 18 top banks by an investment banking analyst title since the 2013 class, a figure ranking #79, with the blended headline settling seven places lower at #86 on the per-student leg. Converting a large banking network into large-bank analyst seats is the weak link.
29,503 undergrads reduce density to 20.5 profiles per 1,000 undergraduates against a 97.8 median, for a per-capita rank of #87. Mix and recency read better. Venture capital ranks #58 with 100 profiles, or 17 venture capital profiles per 100 IB profiles. Of the 59 top-bank analysts, 43 graduated in 2018 or later and 26 sit at the elite five.
Only 71 percent of profiles currently sit in the United States, so the domestically reachable network is smaller than 606 suggests, and 59 top-bank analysts spread across a decade of classes is a short list of precedents. A UC Irvine student has a genuine base to work from and should expect to build most of the path independently of it.
UCI investment banking placement by bank
Analysts, classes of ~2015+UC Irvine'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 measure59
- 5The elite five: Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, J.P. Morgan, Evercore, and Centerview26
By count alone UC Irvine ranks #79 of 100; the table of schools ranked nearby, below, sets that figure beside its neighbors.
Where UCI alumni land beyond investment banking
Alumni profiles, all yearsUC Irvine’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 UCI
Merage’s 2025 employment report covers its 530 business administration graduates under NACE standards: 280 were seeking jobs and 234 accepted one, 83.6%, with 51 continuing education and 80 not seeking; the 126 who reported pay averaged $71,743 with a $73,500 median. Financial services was the second-largest industry at 40 hires behind accounting at 57, at a $68,083 mean, and the finance function took 24 graduates at a $67,610 mean; JPMorgan Chase and Morgan Stanley each hired 2 while Deloitte and KPMG hired 10 apiece.
The same report’s class profile shows why the school reads as a regional business pipeline: 56% women, 46% first-generation, and 15.2% international students, on a 16.5% admit rate, and the reporting note adds that business administration figures use six-month results to match the school’s graduate programs rather than the three-month standard.
The UC Investments Academy, launched by the UC Office of the President in 2022 with 100 students at UC Merced and since expanded across campuses, offers free asset management training and project work tied to the system’s multi-billion-dollar portfolio, open to undergraduates of any major with first- and second-year students encouraged; one Irvine participant went on to a New York investment banking summer analyst seat after an internship with the UC Investments private equity team.
Forum sentiment is non-target with a recent uptick: a 2026 thread notes an Irvine student placing at Centerview, Barclays, and J.P. Morgan technology groups this cycle with two more into banking, called unreal for the school; older threads found a complete lack of information on campus recruiting, described Irvine as a commuter school in a booming Orange County business hub with strong real estate programs, and listed Stanford, Berkeley, UCLA, and USC as the West Coast targets.
Our data ranks UCI #86 on 606 top-bank analysts, the #63 count in the country, from 29,503 undergraduates, or 20.5 per 1,000; 71% 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 UCI publishes about outcomes
20 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.
Paul Merage School of Business, 2025 Annual Employment Report (PDF)
- Business administration graduates, Class of 2025
- 530
- Graduates seeking employment
- 280
- Graduates who accepted a job
- 234 (83.6%)
- Continuing education
- 51
- Not seeking employment
- 80
- Graduates reporting compensation
- 126
- Mean starting salary, business administration
- $71,743
- Median starting salary, business administration
- $73,500
- Financial services hires
- 40
- Accounting hires
- 57
- Financial services mean salary
- $68,083
- Finance function hires
- 24
- Finance function mean salary
- $67,610
- JPMorgan Chase and Morgan Stanley hires each
- 2
- Deloitte and KPMG hires each
- 10
- Women in the class
- 56%
- First-generation students in the class
- 46%
- International students in the class
- 15.2%
- Admit rate
- 16.5%
Paul Merage School of Business, UC Investments Academy
- UC Investments Academy students at launch, 2022
- 100
How UCI compares with schools ranked nearby
Analysts at 18 top banks, ~2015+UCI investment banking FAQ
8 questionsIs UC Irvine a target school for investment banking?
UC Irvine is a non-target school for investment banking by our count. It ranks #86 of the 100 schools we measure: 59 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 606 profiles that include an investment banking job title.
How many UCI alumni are analysts at the top investment banks?
59 UC Irvine alumni from the classes of roughly 2015 onward hold investment banking analyst titles alongside one of the 18 top banks we measure, the #79 count of the 100 schools ranked; 26 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 UC Irvine as a target school?
No; forum posters call it a non-target with sparse campus recruiting, though a 2026 thread counts a Centerview, Barclays, and J.P. Morgan sweep by one student as a sign of movement. Our count ranks it #86 of 100.
What share of Merage business graduates go into finance?
Financial services took 40 of 234 accepted jobs in the Class of 2025, second to accounting at 57, at a $68,083 mean salary; the finance function accounted for 24 graduates.
What is the UC Investments Academy?
A free asset management training program launched by the UC Office of the President in 2022 and open to undergraduates of any major, with projects tied to the system’s portfolio and mentorship from finance professionals.
How many UC Irvine alumni work in private equity?
258 UC Irvine alumni profiles include a private equity job title, ranking #69 of the 100 schools in our database.
How many UC Irvine alumni work in venture capital?
100 UC Irvine alumni profiles include a venture capital job title, ranking #58 of the 100 schools in our database.
How many UC Irvine alumni work in hedge fund?
41 UC Irvine alumni profiles include a hedge fund job title, ranking #65 of the 100 schools in our database.
How we counted UCI’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 UC Irvine 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, 430 (71%) are currently based in the United States and 176 are abroad. The per-1,000 figure divides the network count by 29,503 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.
