Firm Commitment or best Efforts. When an investment bank es" to raise money for a company, how confident company can that be that a specific amount of money will be in their bank account? The degree of confidence depends on numerous factors, primary among them an understanding of the two types of promises. Firm Commitment. A firm commitment means that the man- aging investment bank and its syndicate will agree to buy the entire issue at a negotiated price. The underwriter will then resell these shares to its clients, making as its profits the pre- viously negotiated spread, which is the difference between the gross proceeds paid by the public and the net proceeds given to the issuer. This means that the underwriters bear the entire risk of per-share pricing and the amount of total proceeds to be raised. (It should be stressed that a frm commitment is often not as "firm" as it appears.