You can’t do much, unfortunately. I definitely would not email them to correct your mistake or otherwise notify them, as this will just draw attention to the issue and hurt your chances. I would probably just ignore it, hope it doesn’t come up again, and keep going with the interview process. This is usually not the type of thing where they ask repeatedly about your offer status if you’ve already said, “Yes.”

Hi Brian – had an interview where they asked about return offer which I did not get an panicked and said I got one. What is the best course of action?

Thanks. I’ve thought about it but not really sure there is much to say here – there are already a lot of articles about issues like what to do with no return offer, no full-time offer, no internship, etc., and even what to do after you get fired. Some of these are quite old, but I’m not sure the fundamentals have changed much over time.

All you can really do in this case is keep looking for banking/finance jobs if you have solid leads/a decent network or go for something corporate or another less-competitive job. I don’t really think Master’s programs or MBAs are good options in this case because you’re betting that the market will improve in 1-2 years, which may or may not happen.