The highest starting City salaries across banking with M&A, sales and trading leading the rankings
Banking may be well paid, but even by its standards, some pay better than others.
Now salary benchmarking site Emolument has assessed salaries from 338 recent graduates starting their careers in banking, with M&A, sales and trading, looking at the institutions which come top for bringing in the most money early on.
At £50,000, starting salaries at some investment banks are more than twice the average City graduate paycheck, which Emolument says is £24,000.
And the research noted that while the pay gap between revenue-generating employees such as traders and back-office support staff starts early at around £13,000, it soon stretches further once bonuses begin to roll in.
2017 analyst salaries by job
| Job | 2017 starting salary |
| M&A | £50,000 |
| Trading | £50,000 |
| Institutional sales | £50,000 |
| Origination/Syndication | £45,000 |
| Research | £45,000 |
| Middle and back office | £37,000 |
Emolument also combed through salaries to assess whether putting in the extra time for a PhD or MBA is worth it. Those with an MBA and PhD had a substantially higher starting salary than those holding a bachelor degree, at £75,000. That's because whatever their field of expertise, they jump in ahead of undergraduate peers by joining as associates, a level up from analysts.
2017 analyst salaries by degree
| Degree | 2017 starting salary |
| MBA | £75,000 |
| PhD | £75,000 |
| Masters in finance | £45,000 |
| Masters in science | £45,000 |
| Bachelor of science | £41,000 |
| Bachelor of arts | £33,000 |
Graduates with a BSc degree also start their banking career with a 20 per cent higher salary than those with a BA, according to the research, at £41,000 versus £33,000. Emolument said they were likely to be the most desirable graduates on the market "and therefore poached by best paying institutions".
However, the benefits of some postgraduate degrees weren't so distinct, such as a master of finance or science. Graduates of those earned nine per cent more than a BSc graduate, but factoring in the cost of obtaining the qualification, Emolument said the short-term return on investment wasn't a winner.