V5 iBanking GCs and Exit-options Forum

[Zhuangyuan Kang]

Gospel on this forum is that exit options within the V20 are indistinguishable, but I noticed something interesting when looking at the General Counsel of many of the large investment banks:

Goldman Sachs & Co General Counsel - Karen Seymour (Sullivan & Cromwell)
Morgan Stanley CLO - Eric Grossman (Davis Polk)
JPMorgan Chase & Co General Counsel - Stacey Friedman (Sullivan & Cromwell)
Evercore General Counsel - Jason Klurfeld (Sullivan & Cromwell)
Lazard General Counsel - Scott D. Hoffman (Cravath)
Moelis & Company General Counsel - Osamu Watanabe (Sullivan & Cromwell)
Credit Suisse General Counsel - Romeo Cerutti (Latham & Watkins)
Centerview Partners General Counsel - Matthew Walsh (Gibson Dunn)

Anyone know why this pattern holds? Obviously it doesn't mean that exit options are going to be better all around for V5/V10, but it is interesting to see the obvious skew here in hiring for these uber-prestigious positions coming from the V10 law firms.


Sullivan & Cromwell for whatever reason also seems to be a clear outlier here as well.

[Anonymous User]

Just goes to show why White & Case is the best NY firm

[JustLurking46]

S&C has deep (early 20th century) ties to GS and a particularly strong bank reg / financial institutions practice. DPW has deep ties to MS and does lots of bank-side lending work. Guessing Cravath has strong ties to Lazard.

Chambers practice area rankings are a much better gauge for exit opportunities. Wouldn’t put too much stock in Vault.

[ExpOriental]

It's amazing that this needs to be pointed out, but the significant majority of TLS posters are not biglaw partners.

So when people discuss "exit ops" here, they're discussing exit ops for largely fungible midlevel associates, not exit ops for senior partners who have decades of institutional cache and relationships.

[Sackboy]

It's amazing that this needs to be pointed out, but the significant majority of TLS posters are not biglaw partners.

So when people discuss "exit ops" here, they're discussing exit ops for largely fungible midlevel associates, not exit ops for senior partners who have decades of institutional cache and relationships.

This. When people say V20 exit ops are indistinguishable, they mean that you're equally competitive for a variety of good positions at F500 companies. Obviously, if you come from a white shoe NY firm, you're likely going to have much stronger ties to the big financial institutions. If you come from Latham or Kirkland, you're going to have better ties to LA/Chicago. Etc. I would have thought this much would have been obvious.

I'm sure if you pulled up GCs of PE funds you'll find the repeat PE players represented in those ranks. I'm sure if you look at some of the SV tech firm startups their GCs disproportionately come from the tech firms like Cooley/WSGR/Fenwick/etc.

[SummerAssociate1689]

It's rly mindblowing stuff like this still gets posted on TLS lmao. In what world is the ex-firms of GCs of NYC based banks a good indicator of exit ops for midlevels?

And more importantly, why are you trying to exit to the banks. You'll be making less pay for relatively similar hours.

[jsnow212]

How the top eight or so legal seats in a given industry were filled should not be a relevant to the vast majority of people going into V20 biglaw.

[ExpOriental]

It's rly mindblowing stuff like this still gets posted on TLS lmao. In what world is the ex-firms of GCs of NYC based banks a good indicator of exit ops for midlevels?

And more importantly, why are you trying to exit to the banks. You'll be making less pay for relatively similar hours.

Because OP is gonna make partner, duh.

Also, it's totally worth the comp hit for that sweet "uber-prestige," as OP rightfully points out.

[Zhuangyuan Kang]

It's amazing that this needs to be pointed out, but the significant majority of TLS posters are not biglaw partners.

So when people discuss "exit ops" here, they're discussing exit ops for largely fungible midlevel associates, not exit ops for senior partners who have decades of institutional cache and relationships.

This. When people say V20 exit ops are indistinguishable, they mean that you're equally competitive for a variety of good positions at F500 companies. Obviously, if you come from a white shoe NY firm, you're likely going to have much stronger ties to the big financial institutions. If you come from Latham or Kirkland, you're going to have better ties to LA/Chicago. Etc. I would have thought this much would have been obvious.

I'm sure if you pulled up GCs of PE funds you'll find the repeat PE players represented in those ranks. I'm sure if you look at some of the SV tech firm startups their GCs disproportionately come from the tech firms like Cooley/WSGR/Fenwick/etc.

I mean, even in the other industries you mention the pattern still holds. Look up the big PE funds, you see a lot of Simpson Thacher / Kirkland.

Interestingly, for VC the General Counsel of Sequoia again hails from SullCrom.

My post was just to take notice that for whatever reason it seems that V10 alumni are filtering up to the very highest echelons of the legal industry. And not all of these people are partners who have been poached from their firms, quite a few began at a V10 and then eventually landed the GC position.

Doesn't strike me as an especially stupid idea to suggest that this empirical observation may result because the V10 firms, on aggregate, having stronger exit opportunities than other law firms.

[Sackboy]

It's rly mindblowing stuff like this still gets posted on TLS lmao. In what world is the ex-firms of GCs of NYC based banks a good indicator of exit ops for midlevels?

And more importantly, why are you trying to exit to the banks. You'll be making less pay for relatively similar hours.

This is also the same site where we see posters asking "what firm gives me the best shot at partnership," who are also foaming at the mouth at PPP numbers, without taking a second to think that maybe this job is miserable, unsustainable, and something you don't want to be a "partner" in. They somehow don't have these faults despite half the lawyers on this board complaining about crushing hours, unreasonable client and partner demands, and other shit.

[Elston Gunn]

If you go to White & Case you’ll have to settle for being the GC of SocGen’s US subsidiary or some shit. Sad.

[Zhuangyuan Kang]

It's rly mindblowing stuff like this still gets posted on TLS lmao. In what world is the ex-firms of GCs of NYC based banks a good indicator of exit ops for midlevels?

And more importantly, why are you trying to exit to the banks. You'll be making less pay for relatively similar hours.

I'm obviously not suggesting that anyone go to a V5 with the goal of getting GC at an investment bank.

What I am saying is, Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan, Morgan Stanley, etc. are all top-self institutional clients with deep pockets, maybe some of the best clients that a firm can possibly have. Any firm would want their alumni to be in-house or GC to secure future business.

It's not like Sullivan & Cromwell has a monopoly over Goldman Sachs or JPMorgan's business either. Both banks work with a lot of partners from other firms. But, when it comes to hiring General Counsel, both chose Sullivan & Cromwell as the pick of the litter over any other firm.

Is it really absurd to suggest that the empirical observation that V10 alumni are filtering up to the absolute upper echelon of the legal industry might have something to do with overall better legal outcomes in general compared to other firms?

[CovidLurker]

Think you got a bit of the chicken and egg thing going on here. Do you think that the CLO of a V5 bank got there bc they worked at Cravath/SulCrom. Or do you think the type of person that works at Cravath/SulCrom is the type of person to end up as CLO of a v5 bank?

Let's put this another way - Harvard has produced more U.S. Presidents than any other school. Do you think they teach people how to become President at Harvard, or do you think the type of person that ends up being president also is the type of person that goes to Harvard?

[Monochromatic Oeuvre]

Yeah bro, and Pete Davidson, Jason Sudeikis and Colin Jost bagged Ariana Grande, Olivia Wilde and Scarlett Johansson, so after you make V5 partner, you should get a spot on SNL too.

[SummerAssociate1689]

It's rly mindblowing stuff like this still gets posted on TLS lmao. In what world is the ex-firms of GCs of NYC based banks a good indicator of exit ops for midlevels?

And more importantly, why are you trying to exit to the banks. You'll be making less pay for relatively similar hours.

I'm obviously not suggesting that anyone go to a V5 with the goal of getting GC at an investment bank.

What I am saying is, Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan, Morgan Stanley, etc. are all top-self institutional clients with deep pockets, maybe some of the best clients that a firm can possibly have. Any firm would want their alumni to be in-house or GC to secure future business.

It's not like Sullivan & Cromwell has a monopoly over Goldman Sachs or JPMorgan's business either. Both banks work with a lot of partners from other firms. But, when it comes to hiring General Counsel, both chose Sullivan & Cromwell as the pick of the litter over any other firm.

Is it really absurd to suggest that the empirical observation that V10 alumni are filtering up to the absolute upper echelon of the legal industry might have something to do with overall better legal outcomes in general compared to other firms?

This varies greatly by industry as indicated by previous posters. You picked institutional NYC banks that obviously have great client ties with institutional white shoe law firms. However, I am a V5 associate and the majority of my colleagues do not view exiting to any of those banks in a legal capacity as a "top exit". In fact, it's probably a backup relative to something like a FAANG or distressed debt fund.