Goldman Sachs Investment Banking (IB) Summer Analyst Interview Guide

Goldman Sachs screens investment banking summer analyst candidates through a HireVue video interview that, unlike the video rounds at JPMorgan and Morgan Stanley, runs as a single take per question. The HireVue covers a deal you followed in the news and a client scenario where the request conflicts with firm policy, alongside some behavioral questions. Interviewers save valuation and accounting for the Superday, so the video round tests judgment and delivery.

This guide breaks down each stage of the IB summer analyst interview process, what Goldman Sachs interviewers look for, and how to prepare with real example questions, actionable tips, and resources.

Goldman Sachs IB summer analyst interview process

Goldman Sachs decides its investment banking summer analyst class across a recorded video interview and a single day of live interviews. There's no recruiter screen, no online assessment, and no written case between the resume review and the Superday.

Here's what the interview process can look like:

Application and resume screen: Rolling review, with HireVue invitations released office by office
HireVue video interview: Recorded, mostly behavioral, and due roughly 3 days after the invitation
Superday: Back-to-back interviews with bankers at mixed seniority levels

Some US investment banking candidates also complete a group preference survey between the HireVue and the Superday. It signals interest without guaranteeing placement.

Goldman Sachs IB summer analyst recruiting timeline

Goldman Sachs recruits investment banking summer analysts roughly 18 months ahead of the internship start, and investment banking postings go live months before the firmwide application date. The Americas portal for the 2027 program opened in August 2026, but investment banking Classic postings for that same class went live in January 2026 and most seats were gone by spring.

Investment banking runs on the same accelerated calendar as Morgan Stanley, JPMorgan, Citi, and Bank of America. A candidate who waits for the headline firmwide date will find the seats filled.

Key application dates

Applications open: Investment banking postings have gone live in December or January in recent cycles, ahead of the firmwide Americas date
Application deadline: None published for the Americas or EMEA, where postings close once seats fill
APAC deadline: October 4, 2026 for the 2027 program
India: Applications opened July 1, 2026 for the 2027 program
Recruiting policy: Rolling review, with up to 4 division and location combinations per recruiting year

Submitting a fifth application withdraws one of your earlier ones automatically, so choose your 4 deliberately.

Typical interview process and response times

Application to HireVue invitation: A few days, released office by office
HireVue completion window: 3 to 7 days, with a fixed deadline stated in the invitation
HireVue to Superday invitation: 1 week to 1 month
Superday to decision: Same day to 3 weeks, batched by region

Invitations roll out by office. In the 2027 cycle, Los Angeles and San Francisco went first, followed by Chicago, Dallas, and Toronto, with New York last in a single large batch.

Silence isn't a reliable rejection signal at any stage. You might go 2 weeks without contact and then receive an offer, and Goldman doesn't always send a rejection.

HireVue video interview

The Goldman Sachs HireVue for IB summer analysts is a recorded video interview of roughly 3 to 6 questions covering your background, your motivation for banking, and your read on recent market activity. You get about 30 seconds to prepare each answer and roughly 2 minutes to record it.

The HireVue gives you one recording per question. It stops on its own when your time runs out, which means an answer that runs long gets cut off mid-sentence.

Questions stay behavioral and motivational, though a single light technical or deal question sometimes appears. Recruiters review the recordings, so prepare for the HireVue the way you'd prepare for a live conversation, and put your effort into the content of each answer.

Interviewers look for:

Structure under a timer: Whether you directly answer the question and close cleanly before the recording ends
Commercial awareness: How you explain a recent transaction and the buyer's rationale in plain terms
Judgment under conflicting obligations: How you weigh a client's request against firm policy when the two don't reconcile
Ownership of your background: Whether you can defend every line of your resume without notes
Fit with Goldman's stated values: How your examples map to the firm's core values of partnership, client service, integrity, and excellence
Delivery on camera: Your pacing and word choice when no interviewer reacts to you

Recently asked questions

Here are real, recent interview questions reported by candidates:

Why investment banking?
Walk me through your resume.
Walk me through a recent deal you followed in the news. Why did the buyer do it, and what stood out to you?
Tell me about a time you held a teammate accountable for the quality of their work on a shared project.
Tell me about a time you picked the option you liked less because you knew it was the right call. How did you weigh the tradeoffs?
What obstacles have you had to work through to succeed in a past role or assignment?
A key client is happy with the industry report you just presented but asks for extra detail on their competitors, which firm policy prevents you from sharing. How do you handle the conversation, and what do you weigh in deciding what to say?

Superday

The Goldman Sachs IB summer analyst Superday is a set of back-to-back interviews with analysts, associates, and vice presidents, occasionally including a managing director, run over a single day. You'll typically sit 3 interviews at 20 to 30 minutes each.

Goldman schedules between 2 and 5 interviews for campus hires depending on division. There's no group exercise, case study, or presentation component.

Interviewers keep Superday technical questions basic and don't test advanced modeling. Prior finance internships on your resume draw more valuation follow-ups, so prepare the fundamentals even if you're coming from another field.

Interviewers look for:

Command of the fundamentals: Whether you can move between the financial statements, an enterprise value bridge, and a DCF without notes
Depth behind your resume claims: How far you can go on the transactions and models you've listed before you reach the limit of what you know
A specific reason for Goldman: Whether you name a group, a product, or a deal the firm advised on
Market fluency: How you connect rate moves, currency, and deal activity to what the group does
Consistency across interviewers: Whether your story holds when 3 people ask overlapping questions in sequence

Recently asked technical questions

Here are real, recent interview questions reported by Goldman Sachs investment banking candidates:

Explain the three financial statements and the key linkages between them.
Describe the process and methodology for a DCF valuation. How does accelerated depreciation affect a DCF compared to straight line?
Walk me through the three main valuation methodologies, and name the 2 to 3 most common valuation approaches used in M&A.
Explain why cash is typically subtracted when moving from equity value to enterprise value, and why minority interest is subtracted in the same calculation.
Define enterprise value and revenue, and discuss relevant multiples like EV/EBITDA and EV/Revenue. How do you value a start-up with no current financial or operating history?
Company A with a P/E of 10x acquires Company B with a P/E of 3x in an all-stock deal.
If interest rates rise, what happens to the US dollar?

How to prepare for the Goldman Sachs IB summer analyst interview

Practice against the recording limit: Set a 2-minute timer and record yourself answering behavioral questions until you finish inside the window every time. Goldman stops the recording at the limit, which turns a strong answer that runs long into an unfinished one.
Write a closing line for every story: An answer that continues after you've made the point reads as unstructured, and you can't re-record to correct it. Decide how each story ends before you start talking.
Map your stories to Goldman's core values and business principles: Choose 5 to 6 experiences and match each one to a specific principle. Reuse the same set across the HireVue and the Superday so you answer consistently when interviewers cover overlapping ground.
Pick one deal you can defend: Choose an M&A transaction in a sector you follow, and prepare the buyer's rationale, the financing structure, and the case for the price. Interviewers follow up on whichever deal you name, so a transaction you know from headlines won't hold up.
Prepare a situational judgment answer: Goldman asks scenarios where a client request conflicts with firm policy. Practice naming the constraint, offering what you can share, and escalating the rest to a senior banker.
Know every line of your resume in detail: Interviewers dig into your listed experience and scale their technical follow-ups to what you've claimed. Quantify what you built and what changed as a result.
Cover the valuation fundamentals broadly: Work through accounting fundamentals like the financial statements and their linkages, the enterprise value bridge, a DCF walkthrough, and accretion and dilution mechanics.
Apply in the first weeks of the cycle: Goldman reviews on a rolling basis and fills seats as it goes, so a late application competes for whatever remains. Referrals help move your resume through the screen, though they rarely change whether you sit the HireVue.
Run mock interviews on camera: Book mock interviews to practice answering on a timer. An expert coach can review your pacing and word choice, which carry the full weight of an answer when no interviewer reacts to you.

About the Goldman Sachs IB summer analyst role

The Goldman Sachs investment banking summer analyst program runs 9 to 10 weeks and places interns on live coverage or product teams. It functions as the primary pipeline into the full-time analyst class, and roughly 40% of Goldman's partners across all divisions started as campus hires.

Goldman Sachs IB summer analysts typically work on:

Supporting live transactions inside an assigned coverage or product group
Building and updating valuation materials and financial models
Preparing pitch books and client presentations
Researching companies, sectors, and comparable transactions

Goldman Sachs IB summer analyst experience requirements

Goldman recruits summer analysts across academic backgrounds and doesn't require a finance or economics major. Candidates typically apply during sophomore year for an internship the following summer.

Goldman's hiring criteria center on communication, a willingness to take risks, and comfort with failure. The 2026 intern class came from more than 500 universities.

Additional resources

FAQs about the Goldman Sachs investment banking summer analyst interview

Does everyone get a Goldman Sachs HireVue?

Most IB summer analyst candidates who clear the resume screen receive a HireVue invitation, and networking rarely lets you skip it. Referrals help move your application through the screen, though the invitation itself follows automatically once you pass. One completed HireVue often covers every division and location you applied to, though some candidates receive a separate one per office.

Can you re-record your answers in the Goldman Sachs HireVue?

Goldman Sachs doesn't publish a re-record policy, and the HireVue platform runs as a single take per question. You get about 30 seconds to prepare and roughly 2 minutes to answer before the recording stops. Plan each answer fully before you start recording.

How long does Goldman Sachs take to reply after a Superday?

Goldman Sachs responds anywhere from the same day to several weeks after a Superday. Verbal offers sometimes come within hours, and decisions are batched by region, so candidates at the same Superday can get a response at different times. Offers come by phone from your recruiter. If you haven't heard after 2 weeks, one polite follow-up email is appropriate.

Do you choose your group as a Goldman Sachs investment banking summer analyst?

Goldman Sachs lets you choose a division and location on your application, but not your coverage or product group within investment banking. Groups like Healthcare, TMT, and Financial Sponsors get assigned, and they don't appear as options when you apply. Some US candidates complete a group preference survey during the process, though placement still runs through team sessions and networking. In London, you choose a track at application, with Classic and CSG as the main split.

What's the acceptance rate for the Goldman Sachs summer analyst program?

Goldman Sachs doesn't publish an acceptance rate for the investment banking summer analyst program specifically. Firmwide, the internship selection rate has stayed under 1% for 3 consecutive years. The 2026 class came in at roughly 2,500 interns, down from 2,600 the prior year. The 2025 cycle drew more than 360,000 applications.

How much does a Goldman Sachs investment banking summer analyst make?

Goldman Sachs IB summer analysts earn the same base salary as first-year analysts, prorated across the internship and paid without a bonus. Here's the reported first-year compensation for Goldman Sachs investment banking analysts, according to Levels.fyi:

Analyst (first year): $110,000 base
Analyst (total): ~$124,000 including bonus

Goldman doesn't publish summer analyst compensation separately, so treat the analyst base as your anchor and the bonus line as inapplicable to the internship.