Try persuading your old classmates that finance is a fun profession. It's not easy, but at least it used to be possible. The thrill of the deal, the intellectual challenge, the mixture of knowledge and instinct – they were good reasons for genuinely enjoying a job in the capital markets. But these have all almost disappeared. The intellectual challenge may remain, but there are no thrilling deals and markets move without rhyme or reason.

People can always find an excuse for making money and financiers have that down to an art form. But even their limits are being tested. The brutal hammering the stock markets have taken, the savaging of Wall Street by the regulators and widespread redundancies have left many in the industry wondering whether they would be happier elsewhere.