The war for senior bankers is usually described as a war over money. Guarantees, deferred stock buyouts, bigger titles. That is part of it. But look closely at who has moved in the last few weeks and a clearer pattern emerges. Banks are not hiring rainmakers in general. They are hiring specific client franchises, in specific sectors, from people who can build a team around them. For anyone running a bank, an advisory boutique or a business that relies on its bankers, that distinction matters more than the headline package.
A strong year, and a crowded market for talent
The backdrop is a dealmaking market that has rewarded the banks with the deepest benches. Goldman Sachs reported record advisory net revenues of $1,654 million for the third quarter, with investment banking fees up 21% on the same quarter last year. The same release notes that its investment banking fees backlog decreased quarter on quarter, primarily driven by a decrease in advisory. In other words, the work completed this year was strong, and the next wave has to be won.
That is exactly when the hiring gets aggressive. Speaking to Reuters after Mike Joo’s departure from Bank of America in August, Morningstar analyst Austin Taggart said senior banker poaching typically rises when deal pipelines are active. Our own Investment Banking Sector Report Q3 2026 called the fight for senior dealmakers the defining trend of the quarter, from London sector heads moving between banks to independents building out in Europe.
What the latest moves tell us
Three recent examples show what banks are really paying for.
Sector franchise, not seniority. JPMorgan has named former Sycamore Partners executive Rob Sweeney as a global chair of investment banking, focused on consumer and retail clients, and a source told Reuters the bank has hired more than 1,000 bankers globally this year. A week later, Reuters reported that Richard Peacock, a senior consumer and retail M&A banker at Bank of America, will become global head of consumer and retail M&A at JPMorgan early next year. The same report notes JPMorgan has also recently hired David Fishman, Amy Lissauer and Kevin Brunner from Bank of America. This is a bank concentrating firepower in a sector where it already leads, not filling generic gaps.
Private capital coverage. Peacock was named earlier this year as co-head of Bank of America’s newly created private capital M&A group, which helps private equity firms monetise assets. Bankers who can originate with sponsors, and who understand exits, continuation vehicles and portfolio sales, are among the most portable people in the market. Sponsors move their mandates with people they trust.
Teams that already work together. Evercore has hired John Song and Jean Stack as senior managing directors to expand its aerospace and defense team. At Baird they co-led the defence, space and government practice, and since 2021 they have executed 100 transactions worth nearly $50 billion. Citi offers the same lesson at a larger scale: GlobalCapital described head of banking Vis Raghavan’s hiring as putting the team back together, with an aim to increase managing director headcount by 15% over three years.
The other side of the ledger
Every hire is somebody else’s departure. Bank of America has lost several senior dealmakers this year, yet it says it has hired more than 40 new managing directors in its corporate and investment bank. Both things can be true at once. The question for any leadership team is not whether people will leave in a hot market. It is whether the client relationships leave with them, and whether the next layer is ready to step up.
That is where many banks are exposed. A senior banker’s franchise is often held in one person’s head and diary. When that person walks, the sector coverage can go from strong to thin in a single afternoon. The banks that cope best are the ones that have deliberately built shared client coverage and a credible successor before anyone resigns.
What banks are really hiring for
From where we sit, the brief for a senior dealmaker has shifted in four ways.
- Proven origination in a defined sector. Not “senior coverage banker”, but the person the sector’s chief executives and sponsors call first.
- Sponsor fluency. Private capital is now a source of buy side and sell side mandates in almost every sector, and banks want bankers who can work both.
- The ability to build. A rainmaker who cannot recruit, develop and keep a team creates a dependency, not a franchise.
- Fit with the platform. Bulge bracket, boutique and mid-market firms win work in very different ways. A great banker on the wrong platform rarely delivers the business case that justified the hire.
The brief is no longer “bring a book”. It is “bring a book we can keep”.
Questions for leaders
Whether you run a bank, an advisory firm or a business that depends on its advisers, these are worth asking now:
- Which of our most important client relationships would be at risk if one senior banker left tomorrow?
- Do we have a named successor for each sector head, and would our clients accept them?
- When we hire laterally, are we buying a franchise or a title? How do we test the difference before we commit?
- How strong is our coverage of private capital sponsors, and who owns it?
- What are we doing to keep the people competitors are calling, beyond the next bonus round?
Talk to us
Phoenix Search advises banks, advisory boutiques and financial services businesses across Ireland, the UK and the US on senior hiring, succession and team builds. If you are planning a sector build, replacing a departing leader or testing the strength of your bench, our investment banking executive search team would be glad to talk. Get in touch here.
