"The Pulse" -- #94 / Diversification

Recruiting Timeline:

Banking:

Where We’re At:

• SA 2026: Province, Digital Capital Advisors, and TM Capital Corp all opened applications this week. 92 firms are actively recruiting for summer 2026 positions

• The summer 2026 recruiting season is ~85% complete with only a few smaller banks poised to open apps

• If you need some interview support or just need a place to vent, check out our Coaching Program: Coaching for banking, consulting, and buyside recruiting | The Pulse. 95%+ of those coached for the summer 2025 recruiting season received offers!

New SA 2026 Applications:

• Province: Boutique restructuring firm (SA 2026)

• Digital Capital Advisors: Tech boutique (SA 2026)

• TM Capital Corp: Specialty chemicals M&A (SA 2026)

See below to gain access to our premium database, updated weekly, which houses the application processes for over 300+ banks/consulting/buyside firms! Gain an edge over everyone else by not having to spend countless hours tracking applications and deadlines.

Consulting:

Where We’re At:

• We have stopped tracking 2025 recruiting and SA/FT 2026 recruiting is just beginning. There are currently 4 applications open. You should be attending tons of info sessions and coffee chats. Also, you should ensure your cover letter is ready to go so you can apply right when apps open. As always, we recommend applying early and often!

SA 2026 released apps:

• None

FT 2026 released apps:

• None

Buyside:

Where We’re At:

• SA 2026: Ampfield Management, LBC Credit Partners, Northwestern Mutual, and one other firm opened their SA 2026 applications. Currently 76 buyside firms are recruiting for SA 2026 seats 

New SA 2026 released apps:

• Ampfield Management: Fundamental long HF (SA 2026)

• Silversmith Partners: Private equity summer analyst (SA 2026)

• Northwestern Mutual: Investment arm, pe and pc intern (SA 2026)

• LBC Credit Partners: Private credit intern (SA 2026)

The database is updated weekly and contains 300+ Investment Banking and Consulting internships/full-time positions along with:

• Interview tips for specific companies

• Interview prep material

• Applications and deadlines linked so that you can apply with one click

• Insider information about the application process

• Professionals to network with

• Buyside deadlines, interview prep, and people to network with for the sweatiest of students

We send the updated dataset every week with the latest banking and consulting job postings. We released our 94th update today.

Students we have been helping have already landed roles at Blackstone, Goldman, J.P. Morgan, Jefferies, Citi, and Solomon.

To get access to the database and the weekly updates, you pay a one-time fee of $65 Credit Card / Debit Card: (ThePulsePrep—Stripe.com) that grants you annual access to the updated database (please reach out for additional payment options). If you don’t find our services helpful, we simply ask for feedback on an area we can improve upon and will refund your $65.

This is a small investment for a huge payout when you secure your dream offer!

Premium Database——>Database for banking, consulting and buyside roles | The Pulse 

Market Update:

Diversification

It’s been an absolute blood bath in the equities markets lately…

In fact, the ‘market’ entered a technical correction this past week. Tariffs are mostly to blame, but you also can’t deny that the market was incredibly frothy to finish off 2024. We pointed this out numerous times and what goes up, must eventually come down.

Since most of you are only a few years deep into the investing game, this might be one of your first corrections. Maybe you weathered Covid and maybe you had skin in the game during 2022, but we haven’t seen a real recession since 2008.

Also, I’m going to assume that the bulk of you aren’t well diversified. You’re probably over-exposed to tech equities and commodities like crypto—both of which have seen the worst impact over the past month.

So, over the past month your personal account is probably trading at least 8-10% lower from ATHs just a few months ago. But…it doesn’t have to be this way. As we can see above, all equities are getting fried while a ‘safe-haven’ asset like gold actually became more valuable.

Also, bonds are still paying coupon and rates are still expected to be cut later this year. So, bonds have performed well over the past month.

Now, you’re young and you honestly don’t need to be holding ‘boring’ assets like gold and bonds if you’re investing on a lifetime horizon. You don’t have dependents, and you have ~65 years of compounding ahead of you so being concentrated in ‘riskier’ assets today is ok (not investment advice—see full disclosure at the bottom).

Regardless, my point today is that the whole world isn’t losing right now. Some people are holding diversified portfolios of assets to mitigate risk (wild concept lmao). Books like ‘A Random Walk Down Wall Street’ and ‘The Intelligent Investor’ are great reminders of the beauty of diversification.

With diversification, you can optimize your risk / return profile. It’s incredible and probably the second-best financial wonder behind compound interest.

Peep the graph below for another illustration of diversification:

Reducing unsystematic risk is critical for portfolio construction. You don’t want events like the bankruptcy of any particular company, creation of new tech, or moves of any other investor to critically impair your portfolio. By holding a diverse array of loosely correlated assets, you can minimize your risk of impairment from unsystematic risk.

A final thought: the best investors aren’t only judged by their return, they’re also judged by their ability to navigate a downturn. 

Disclosure: Nothing written here is financial advice or should be used for investment decisions.

Are you unhappy with how banking recruiting has gone?

We’ve had a few students purchase coaching sessions or just email us asking what they should do if they haven’t landed an SA 2026 banking seat. A lot of them ask if they should go for a consulting role.

If you’ve missed the boat on banking, consulting is a great alternative. You build a similar skill set (hence why PE firms hire bankers AND consultants) and you get a great experience on your resume. 

You can always push for FT banking roles and having a consulting gig on your resume is compelling.

This is not at all to say that consulting is banking’s red-headed stepchild. Rather, consulting is a solid career path that just happens to recruit slightly later than banking.

This is all to say that if you didn’t land the banking role you are not screwed. Consulting is a great option and you can always recruit for asset management roles.

There’s no reason to beat yourself up–this is a highly competitive process. However, pivot quickly should banking not go your way. Make sure to case prep and network ASAP.

It might be more work, but you can apply to banking roles that are still hiring while recruiting for consulting. The most important thing is to lock up a role for SA 2026 that will position you well for FT banking recruiting (if that is still what you want to do).

If you want more tailored advice book a coaching session and email us at [email protected]!

Going Forward:

Are you starting your banking / consulting FT job this summer?

We are carefully rolling out our Buyside Associate prep solutions. This will be the best tool to land a job in PE, PC, HF, or VC / GE after your analyst stint. Please shoot us an email @[email protected], if you’d like to be a part of our first cohort—services will be 100% free.

Please reach out to us with any questions about recruiting or if you’re interested in meeting the team! ([email protected])

We are happy to chat, review resumes, or help set up a coaching session

Check us out on LinkedIn (The Pulse) and Instagram (ThePulse)

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The Pulse

“The Pulse” #94

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