After bottoming out in 2023, investment banking pay has staged a two-year rally — and the 2025 data makes clear that the recovery is real, broad-based, and steepest at the top. Based on 866 survey responses collected in Q1 2026 across 17 title levels and 8 bank types, here’s what the numbers actually show.
Bonuses are up — a lot. Seventy-nine percent of survey respondents received a higher 2025 bonus than 2024, with nearly half seeing gains of 20% or more. Only 8% saw declines. The recovery held across bank types: Elite Boutiques (88%), Bulge Brackets (83%), and Middle Markets (80%) all participated. This is the second consecutive year of bonus growth following the 2023 trough, and for most levels it effectively erases the pain of that down cycle.
Senior bankers won the most. Three-year total comp growth ranges from a modest +8% at Analyst 1 ($148K → $160K) to +30–35% at the MD level, with Group Heads seeing the most dramatic recovery at +57% ($1.1M → $1.75M). The upside in IB continues to be overwhelmingly concentrated at senior levels, where bonus can represent 70–77% of total compensation. Junior levels recovered too — but because base salary dominates at the Analyst and Associate levels, the percentage gains are naturally smaller.
The Elite Boutique premium is real — but it’s not permanent. EB leads BB by 43% at Associate 1 ($400K vs. $280K), and the cumulative career advantage through VP 2 amounts to roughly $518K in total earnings — or ~$405K on a cash-adjusted basis after deferrals. However, by VP 3 the gap narrows to just 3%, and at the Executive Director level, BB actually overtakes EB ($878K vs. $788K). EB partially recovers at MD (1-3 Yrs) ($1.325M vs. $1.2M), before both converge exactly at $1.6M at MD (4+ Yrs). The EB edge is front-loaded — strongest at Associate and early VP — and shouldn’t be extrapolated through an entire career.
Middle Market is more competitive than it looks — early on. MM tracks close to BB at the Associate level (A2: $340K, A3: $410K vs. BB’s $339K and $450K respectively), making it a genuinely competitive option for junior bankers. The gap opens up meaningfully at the VP level, where MM VP 2 ($500K) trails BB ($580K) by 16% and EB ($660K) by 24%. Over a full five-level arc from Associate 1 through VP 2, the MM cumulative total of $2.03M sits $112K below BB and $638K below EB. MM offers more pay stability with less volatility — the tradeoff is lower upside in strong deal years.
Product group matters at the top. For senior bankers, which group you sit in can be as important as which bank. Leveraged Finance stands out at the MD level — LevFin MD (4+ Yrs) came in at $1.6M, matching the EB and BB medians, reflecting fierce competition for experienced talent in that market. Healthcare produced the highest single Exec Director reading in the dataset at $1.2M. M&A pays its premium late, with Director 2 coming in at $1.03M — 45% above the all-groups baseline. TMT captures its premium earlier, leading at VP 1 ($600K, +20% vs. baseline) before compressing at more senior levels.
The VP inflection point. VP 1 is where the compensation structure fundamentally shifts: $255K base meets $250K bonus, making it the structural dividing line between “salary earner” and “bonus-dependent” pay. From VP 2 onward, bonus exceeds base — and deferral begins to bite meaningfully. VP 3 bankers defer roughly 26–30% of their bonus on average, and by MD level, 67–70% of respondents defer more than 25%. Many Directors and MDs are taking home $100K–$200K less than their headline number in year one, a gap that matters enormously when evaluating competing offers.
One notable exception: senior MDs. MD (4+ Years) is the only title where more than 20% of respondents reported lower bonuses in 2025. Only 47% saw higher pay — the softest reading of any level — and the headline all-bank median of $1.1M masks a deeply bimodal split: EB/BB/Canadian MDs cluster near $1.5M, while Boutique IB and Large US Bank MDs cluster near $738K. The bottom quartile of experienced MDs earns roughly the same as the median VP 3 — a critical data point for anyone navigating retention conversations at that level.
Geography matters more than people think. New York is not always the top market in real terms. A Midwest VP 1 earning $525K — equal to the NYC median — has the purchasing-power equivalent of $861K in New York, a 64% real advantage. A Texas VP 2 at $575K adjusts to over $1M in NYC equivalent purchasing power, with no state income tax adding further lift. For VP-level and above bankers open to regional markets, the real compensation picture looks very different from the nominal one.
Mobility is elevated despite the recovery. Sixty-four percent of respondents are actively considering or open to a move — a striking figure in an up-bonus year, and a signal that compensation gains alone haven’t resolved the underlying push factors. Senior bankers (MDs and Group Heads) show the highest openness at 78–82%, consistent with their relatively weaker bonus recovery. EB bankers, despite earning the most, show the lowest active “Yes” rate at 20% — reflecting a group that has already self-selected into their preferred environment. Notice period constraints are the primary structural barrier to movement: 89% of MD (1-3 Yrs) respondents face obligations of 2+ months, effectively compressing the practical recruitment window to the February–April post-bonus period each year. For firms looking to poach senior talent, the clock starts ticking the moment bonuses are paid.
The full report covers 17 title levels, 8 bank types, 16 product groups, and 8 geographic regions, with detailed deferral, clawback, promotion rate, and historical trend data from Prospect Rock Partners’ 2023–2025 annual surveys.