Fund administrators grapple for graduates
Ireland's fund servicing sector is growing faster than ever, which is good news if you're a graduate hoping for a job in finance.
The most recent edition of Lipper's Ireland Fund Encyclopaedia says funds serviced in Ireland reached $1.6 trillion at the end of June, an increase of almost 35% in a year - the fastest growth since 2004.
Rampant expansion in funds under admin is leading to equally rampant growth in jobs, with numbers employed increasing by 22% last year and an expected 15% in 2007, according to Gary Palmer, chief executive of the Irish Funds Industry Association (IFIA).
And with Ireland's supply of fund admin talent already in short supply, there's evidence that funds are increasingly prepared to train up graduates. Palmer says there were over 1,000 graduate hires last year.
State Street told eFinancialCareers it primarily taps the graduate market for Irish recruits, and Bank of Ireland told us it has teamed up with Trinity College, Dublin in a bid to attract students to financial services.
Sean Gannon, director of the careers centre at Trinity College, says this year was the busiest in recent memory, and that Bank of Ireland alone had doubled the number of graduates it took on compared to 2006.
Accountancy students are typically favoured among fund administrators, with both boutiques and behemoths scouring campuses for them. Gannon says 650 to 700 accounting students have been hired from Trinity alone this year.
There are currently 9,000 jobs in the Irish funds industry, according to the IFIA. Of these, a whopping 70% are filled by people under 30, which shows the industry's increasing reliance on graduate talent.
If the industry sounds appealing, you'll have plenty of funds to choose from. There are now 5,646 fund admin specialists in the Republic, State Street being the largest, followed closely by Bank of New York Mellon, and JPMorgan.
The Encyclopaedia suggests Bisys Fund & Hedge Fund Services is expanding the most rapidly (thanks to its acquisition by Citi), followed by SEI Investments, and PFPC International.
