Where to find the best lifestyle - and pay - in finance
Careers in finance are known, above all, for two things: excellent compensation, and abysmal work-life balance. But not everyone working in finance is a banker - or working at a bank. Do they all share the same fate?
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Data from our 2026 Compensation & Lifestyle report suggests not. Based on our Q1 poll, which surveyed over 2,700 professionals in the industry, suggests not.
As expected, the hardest-working people in finance are investment bankers – and more specifically, the investment bankers that work in M&A.
M&A bankers responding to our survey said they worked 67.3 hours per week on average. This was on par with the 67.9 hours they said they worked in 2024 and the 67.1 they said they worked in 2023. The average banker’s hours are far from the infamous 100+ hour weeks reported at the height of the pandemic.
Beyond M&A, only Debt Capital Markets professionals averaged above 60 hours a week. Equity Capital Markets, credit sales & trading, and equities sales & trading professionals all reported average work weeks of around 50 hours a week, which was less than some of their colleagues in support functions such as risk, for example.
Support function professionals working in finance, risk, operations, and compliance (FROC), as well as financial technology, work far more standard hours.
Respondents to our survey working in technology reported working just 43.8 hours per week in 2025. This was up on the 38.9 hours that they reported working in 2024. No other function reported working anything below 40 hours a week, ever.
Curiously, there were only two groups that reported working fewer hours in 2025 than they did in 2024: people that worked in compliance, and people that worked in equity capital markets (ECM).
Pay per hour also changed as a consequence of 2025’s bonuses. The best-paid finance professionals are still working for hedge funds, earning almost $300 on average for each hour they work. Within investment banks, sales & trading professionals were also clear, earning $189 per hour.
Significant bonus increases also meant that quants were earning an eye-watering $144 per hour of work, on par with what M&A professionals earned ($148 per hour) and ahead of both debt and equity capital markets professionals, who earned $136 and $96 per hour on average.
The poorest compensation per hour was to be found people who earned the lowest compensation in general. Professionals in FROC (Finance, Risk, Operations, and Compliance) earned $68, $94, $56, and $76 per hour worked on average – the lowest-paid four functions of the 14 we polled.
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