A firm with good trading software, pricing software, or back office software can get a strong competitive advantage. Six figure salaries are not uncommon for really good systems people. Ratings Analyst One way to break into investment banking is to start as a ratings agency analyst. The pay is relatively low and advancement opportunities aren't great, and the investment banks know it and use the agencies as hunting grounds for new analysts. These agencies are highly profitable and grade the credit quality of companies and sovereign entities accessing the markets.
Most revenue comes from issuer fees.
There is high demand for persons who can rate structured finance and corporate bonds intelligently. These salaries vary with firms and with the region of the country you are in. Lately, salaries have increasingly included an equity component, which may not be liquid for up to three years, although as an analyst you would typically be sheltered from this. This is good for the banks because it makes it much harder for people to move around. You might actually be better off taking less.