What does an Investment Bank do?

We've all heard stories of people making 100k+ right out of school doing banking, but how exactly do they do this and what is Investment Banking?

Looking at it broadly, and Investment Bank is a section of a bank that focuses on institutional, commercial, and high net worth individuals for non-retail services. These services might include trading in fixed income or equity markets, mergers and acquisitions, capital and debt advisory services and wealth management or financial planning. The bank usually makes money off of the amount of capital they have under management in each group or off of the fees they charge for their advisory services.

While it might still not be clear exactly what they do, rest assured that the millions of dollars that investment banks make each year trickle down to the analysts doing research and financial modeling for each case prospective case study. While it might seem like alot of money to make 100k+ at the end of the day, after working 100 hour work weeks investment bankers might not be any better off than the rest of us.

Just some food for thought...