Big Banks To Limit Hours For Young Staffers --- JPMorgan confines weekly hours to 80; Bank of America revamps timekeeping

"JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America plan to limit and more closely track young bankers' hours following a Wall Street Journal investigation that detailed a dangerous culture of overwork on Wall Street.

JPMorgan will now cap junior investment bankers' hours at 80 a week in most cases, people familiar with the matter said. Meanwhile, Bank of America is implementing a new timekeeping tool that requires junior bankers to go into more detail about how their time is spent, other people familiar with the matter said.

The changes come after the Journal investigation, based on conversations with more than three dozen current and former bankers, revealed that junior bankers at Bank of America were routinely instructed to lie about their hours to avoid exceeding hourly limits.

The question of how much to work junior employees, whose entry-level salaries can reach $200,000, has divided Wall Street for decades. Each year, thousands of young people start entry-level jobs in investment banking, attracted by the industry's reputation for turning hard workers into millionaires. But many of them said consistent bouts of working long hours are not only mentally grueling but also hazardous to their health.

The death of a 35-year-old Bank of America associate who had been working 100-hour weeks led to an outcry in the industry about employee protections being ignored. Leo Lukenas III had been working on a team completing a $2 billion deal. An autopsy found he died of a blood clot that formed in a coronary artery.

The weekly cap on hours at JPMorgan, a first for the bank, is the same as the New York state limit for hours of medical residents. The bank plans to make exceptions in certain cases, such as a live deal.

Young bankers at JPMorgan already have a protected window from 6 p.m. Friday to noon Saturday and a guarantee of one full weekend off every three months. The bank, like most of its peers, has long monitored bankers' hours through self-reported time sheets. Young bankers have been known to put in 120 hours a week or more in the thick of a time-sensitive project.

JPMorgan Chief Executive Jamie Dimon said in May the bank was asking "what can we learn from" Lukenas's death. Senior bankers have been communicating the new guideline to staff in recent weeks, some of the people familiar with the matter said.

Bank of America had already capped young bankers' hours, but the Journal found that the guidelines were routinely violated and in some cases bosses told direct reports to lie about how much they were working. Shortly after the Journal's investigation was published, the bank told employees to alert superiors or the human-resources department if they were being pressured to lie about their hours, the Journal reported at the time.

In recent days, Bank of America unveiled a new tool in the company's timekeeping software that requires U.S.-based junior investment bankers to log their hours daily rather than weekly, people familiar with the matter said. They also will be required to detail which deals they are working on when, and which senior bankers are overseeing the assignments, the people said. Junior staff also can gauge how much capacity they have for more work on a scale from 1 to 4.

The new reporting tool will go live next week, the people said. It was being developed before Lukenas's death.

"We successfully piloted this improved technology platform earlier this year to help our team more efficiently serve our investment banking clients," a spokesman for the bank said.

The death over a decade ago of a Bank of America intern in London who had logged long hours at the office prompted some soul-searching in the industry. But enforcement of protective guidelines put in place by many banks has been inconsistent over the years.

At Goldman Sachs, junior bankers famously protested their working conditions in 2021 when the bank's deal business was booming. A person close to the bank said Goldman doesn't plan to change its policies in the near term but will continue to keep an eye on juniors' hours.

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Protections for Most Junior Bankers at Big Wall Street Banks

Bank of America

-- Human resources is flagged when hours worked exceed 80 a week, and intervenes after prolonged periods above that limit to mandate time off.

-- Protected weekend day of no work, with no specific time frame.

JPMorgan Chase

-- 80-hour weekly cap on hours with exceptions for certain circumstances, such as a live deal.

-- "Pencils down" period between 6 p.m. Friday and noon Saturday, with exceptions.

-- In the U.S., one protected full weekend off every three months, plus protected holidays with guaranteed time off.

Goldman Sachs

-- No formal cap on hours worked.

-- "Protected Saturday" of no work between 9 p.m. Friday and 9 a.m. Sunday, with certain exceptions.

Morgan Stanley

-- No formal cap on hours worked.

-- No protected weekend time off." [1]

1. Big Banks To Limit Hours For Young Staffers --- JPMorgan confines weekly hours to 80; Bank of America revamps timekeeping. Saeedy, Alexander.  Wall Street Journal, Eastern edition; New York, N.Y.. 13 Sep 2024: A.1.