2006: Good year vs. bad year

What was hot and what was not in the Irish financial services industry over the past twelve months? Here's our considered opinion.

Good year

Fund industry:

Ireland's fund industry continued to boom. Assets under administration have trebled in the past five years, bringing the total to a gargantuan $1.2 trillion.

Pay hasn't quite trebled, but it has at least risen. Salaries for senior fund administrators rose 15 per cent amid rapid growth in back office roles in Ireland according to finance recruiter Joslin Rowe. Most candidates in the area can now secure multiple job offers.

"Every fund administration client started the year with a high level of vacancies and they are finishing the year the same way," said Nicola Kavanagh, head of the banking division at Hudson. "The staff turnover rate in this sector is huge at 25 per cent. This is because the work is perceived

as quite repetitive and the number of working hours required is very high."

A corollary of fast growth was a shift out of Dublin as fund administrators went provincial in the search for undiscovered pools of talent. Galway, Cork, Limerick, Kilkenny and Wexford all benefited. More than 300 jobs alone are being created in fund administration in Limerick after Chicago-based Northern Trust announced this year it would add a second Irish fund centre in the

city's National Technology Park.

Private banking:

Where there's a millionaire, there's a private banker. Research by the Bank of Ireland suggests there are 30,000 millionaires in Ireland, with the average Irish citizen now richer than their American, British and German counterparts. Little surprise, therefore, that private banking jobs are now more plentiful.

In February, for example, Deutsche Bank announced a joint venture with domestic investment

firm Key Capital to provide wealth management services to Ireland's high net

worth individuals.

"Ten years ago, it was a struggle to attract someone from London to work in this market and now salaries are as competitive as they are in the UK capital," says Kavanagh.

Insurance industry:

Ireland's insurance industry is growing so fast that some recruiters are

turning to the UK market to fill vacancies.

Demand is strongest in areas such as underwriting, life and pension

insurance. And if you're an actuary the world is your oyster.

However, candidates are finding that career progression is slower at

traditional insurers than at the insurance divisions at banks and fund

companies, according to one recruiter.

"Clients are calling out for life and pension administrators and they are

losing candidates to IFSC companies," she said. "They are all competing

against each other for staff."

Bad year

Bank of Ireland Asset Management:

While all around were booming, Bank of Ireland Asset Management struggled to recover from lost pension mandates. The division suffered from the loss of a significant number of pension fund

mandates, poor investment returns, and the defection in 2004 of four key executives to Australian group Perpetual.

The bank announced in September it would merge the troubled business with

its wholesale financial services division in a move viewed by analysts as a

downgrading of the unit.

However, there were some signs of recovery this year when new business

increased the funds under management by €300m.

Corporate finance:

Ireland may be booming, but don't expect to walk into a front office corporate finance role in the country. "When you think about the proximity of Dublin's corporate finance market to

London, it's no wonder so many organisations would happily keep their front

office there," Kavanagh says. "The global companies who are in Dublin are

here for the fund administration side."

Irish women:

By some accounts, salaries for Ireland's army of financial services employees rose by an average of 5 per cent in 2006. How did women in the workplace fair?

They don't appear to have been equal beneficiaries of the 2006 bounty. A report by Robert Half Finance and Accounting suggests Ireland's female financial services employees earn a whopping €20,000 less than their male counterparts.

eFinancialCareers' editorial team will now be taking a festive break before returning in the New Year. A very Merry Christmas to all our readers.