Investment Banking and Finance CV

What a good one includes

• Use a clean, conservative single-page layout with standard margins and professional fonts like Times New Roman or Arial to match industry norms.
• A dedicated transaction or deal list that details your specific contribution to mergers, acquisitions, or capital raises, complete with deal sizes.
• Quantifiable achievements, including percentage returns, portfolio sizes, cost savings, and the specific scale of assets managed.
• Advanced financial modeling proficiencies, highlighting specific expertise in LBO, DCF, and merger consequences modeling.
• Elite academic credentials, GPAs if above 3.5, relevant coursework, and professional designations like the CFA or CAIA.
• An interesting, authentic personal interests section at the bottom to serve as a conversational icebreaker during intense superday interviews.

Common mistakes to avoid

• Relying on vague, qualitative descriptions of your duties rather than providing the exact dollar values of the transactions you worked on.
• Exceeding the strict one-page limit, which signals to finance recruiters an inability to synthesize information concisely under pressure.
• Including colorful graphics, headshots, or creative formatting that fails standard applicant tracking systems and violates conservative banking conventions.
• Neglecting to explicitly state your specific role in a deal, leaving recruiters unsure if you led the analysis or merely formatted the slide deck.

Frequently asked questions