Financial IT job market increasing sharply

Dawinderpal Sahota, Computing, Wednesday 31 March 2010 at 16:44:00

Recent findings show promise for the recovery of IT jobs in finance

The number of IT jobs within the financial services sector increased sharply
during the first two months of 2010, according to specialist recruiter
McGregor
Boyall.

The company claims that the skills most demanded during the first quarter of
2010 were those of developers (42 per cent of vacancies) and business analysts
(16 per cent).

In terms of product areas, the top three most active hirers have been
derivatives (19 per cent), risk (13 per cent) and FX (14 per cent).

The company stated its findings in its Financial Services IT hiring index
which tracks vacancies across 16 financial market organisations.

The company said there has also been an increase in available permanent,
rather than contract, roles, and that this is promising because it suggests
increasing confidence in the sector's recovery.

?We saw a steady increase in hiring requirements from the beginning of 2009
and this upward trend accelerated significantly during the first two months of
2010,? said Laurie Boyall, managing director at McGregor Boyall.

Salary
prospects for IT personnel also look promising, as recruitment firm
Acumin
Consulting recently claimed that pay for IT security staff, at both end user
and channel firms, is once again on the rise.

The news comes just a short while after high-profile job cuts in the sector,
with Lloyd's Banking Group recently
announcing
plans to axe 5,000 jobs by December 2010. IT staff were thought to be among
the worst hit by the cull.

Full story at http://www.computing.co.uk/computing/news/2260569/jobs-finance-rise