Ask anyone about the “best” group in investment banking, and one name will come up repeatedly: mergers & acquisitions (M&A).

It’s so mythical that we even used a slight variation for this site’s name.

People often argue that M&A investment banking offers “the most intellectually challenging tasks” and “the best exit opportunities.”

These claims present a few problems: for example, is aligning shapes on a PowerPoint slide ever an “intellectually challenging task”?

But there’s another problem as well: most people making these arguments don’t understand that working on deals is often boring and repetitive.

M&A investment banking has some benefits, but the hype is far ahead of the reality:

What is M&A Investment Banking?