Fyntraq

Free finance CV templatesThe CV built for screening at J.P. Morgan, Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, Rothschild & Co and Lazard

Want a CV the bank's software reads line for line? Here is the template, already filled in by a student like you. Swap their details for yours.

One-page finance CV template for a student with no finance internship yet: Education first, then Experience, Leadership and Activities, Skills

CV for your first finance internship

First or second year, no internship in banking or a fund so far.

  • Education goes first: it is your strongest section today
  • A summer job, a weekend job and a finance society do the work an internship would
  • Every experience bullet has a number, the summer job included
Download .docxWord, one page. Free, no sign-up.

Is your own CV readable?

See what the bank's software reads from it, field by field. Your first check is free with an account.

Check my CV

One page, one column. Here is why.

Your CV gets read in seconds. At a large bank it sits in a pile of hundreds on a recruiter's screen; at a boutique, a banker reads it between two deals. When the firm, the title and the dates sit in the same place on every line, the reader finds what they need without looking for it.

Software reads it before a person does. Most banks take applications through hiring software such as Workday, Greenhouse or Taleo. It copies your name, schools, jobs and dates into a form, and recruiters filter and search candidates through that form.

Bankers expect one column. Most banker CVs use one, so a sidebar or a second column stands out in the pile for the wrong reason. The real risk for the software is elsewhere: text inside a table, a text box or an icon can come out of it in the wrong order or not at all.

Same student, two CVs. Only one passes every check.

We ran Alex's CV through the Fyntraq CV check twice: once laid out like a generic online template, with a photo, a sidebar and skill dots, once in the finance template. Same jobs, same school.

Generic online layout6 things to fix
The same student's CV in a generic layout: a photo, a tinted sidebar with skill dots, headings such as My journey
  • No work experience found
  • No education found
  • Section titles the portal may not recognise
  • Symbols that come out as junk
  • Image in your file
  • Bullets that open weak

Real output of the Fyntraq CV check on the generic layout.

Finance templateNothing to fix
The first finance CV template: one page, one column, Education first
  • 2 jobs read: Pret A Manger, Waitrose
  • 2 schools read: LSE, Hills Road
  • Standard section titles
  • Plain round bullets
  • No photo
  • Every bullet opens on what you did

Real output of the Fyntraq CV check on the first template.

Check my CVSee what the check says about yours. Your first check is free with an account.

The 8 rules of a finance CV

One page and one column are the frame. Inside it, both templates follow these eight rules. Check your own CV against them before you send it.

Start every experience bullet with an action verb. Built, drafted, screened, led. Never "responsible for" or "helped with": they say you were in the room, not what you did.

Put a number in every experience bullet. A size, a count or a result: €1.2bn, 15 comparable companies, top 10 of 85. If you cannot count it, say what came of it.

Keep each bullet to one or two lines. Up to four bullets for the roles closest to finance, fewer for the rest. A third line tells a story, not a result.

Write dates as a month and a full year. Jul 2025 - Aug 2025, on the right of every entry. The software misreads "07/25", and "Summer 2025" has no month.

One font, single spacing. Calibri, Arial, Garamond or Times New Roman, 10.5 to 11 pt, single line spacing, margins of at least 1.5 cm. Bold for headings, firms, schools and skill labels, italics for job titles.

Plain round bullets, the same all the way down. Type them as a plain "•". Arrows, ticks and icons from symbol fonts such as Wingdings come out of your file as junk characters.

Activities count as experience. A society role, a sport at a competitive level, a part-time job: each gets a title, dates and a bullet with a number, exactly like a job.

Use section titles the software knows. Education, Experience, Leadership & Activities, Skills. A creative title leaves it guessing where your jobs belong.

Write bullets a recruiter reads to the end

The first three rules, applied to three lines students write every year.

Before
Helped with financial analysis on M&A deals
Member of the investment society
Worked in a café over the summer

Nothing here says how big, how many or what came of it.

After
Verb + task + number
Built the three-statement model and DCF for a €1.2bn sell-side mandate; the valuation range set the floor for the first bid round
Wrote a 5-page buy recommendation on a UK mid-cap retailer, backed by a DCF and trading comparables, and pitched it to 40 members
Ran the end-of-day cash-up, £3,500 a day on average, with no variance over 8 weeks

Your cover letter next

Two finished letters, one for a bank and one for a fund, with what goes in each paragraph.

See the letter templates

Before you send it

Should I put a photo on my finance CV?
No for UK and US banks, and no for teams in Paris, Frankfurt or Milan that recruit in English. German firms are the most used to seeing one, and some French and Italian firms too, but a CV without a photo is accepted everywhere, so leaving it off is the safe choice.
Should I send my CV as a PDF or a Word file?
PDF, unless the posting asks for Word. Export it from Word or Google Docs rather than scanning or printing it, then check that you can select the text. If you cannot, the hiring software cannot read it either.
Does a finance CV have to fit on one page?
For internships and graduate programmes, yes. Recruiters expect one page, and a second one usually means the bullets are too long. Cut the oldest and least relevant lines first, starting with school-level activities.
Should Education or Experience go first?
Education first while it is your strongest section, which is usually until your first finance internship. Once you have one, move Experience to the top. That is the only difference in order between the two templates.
Can I use these templates for French, German or Italian firms?
Yes for any team that recruits in English, which is common at international banks and funds in Paris, Frankfurt and Milan. For a posting written in the local language, keep the same layout and write the CV in that language.
Are the templates really free?
Yes. No account and no email. Download the Word file, replace everything with your own details, and send it wherever you want.

Your CV is ready. Now apply first.

Banks read applications in the order they arrive. Set your desks and your cities once. A free account sees every role live for more than 24 hours, Premium emails you the minute one opens.

Start tracking, freeSee Premium