€30k and a stable career move seems like a good option for Irish grads currently

The Irish Central Bank's 150-strong recruitment spree has been something of a shining light in an otherwise bleak financial services hiring market, and this is also the case with its graduate intake.

The regulator is one of the few financial institutions significantly recruiting graduates this year, with 60 places on a starting salary of €30k on offer to start in October. Not surprisingly, they've proven pretty popular, with around 1,500 applications coming in for the roles.

This means just one in 25 of the applications has been successful. Obviously this seems fairly harsh, but figures from High Fliers Research show that there were a whopping 74 applications per vacancy within the UK banking and finance sector this year.

NAMA and the Central Bank are currently firming up plans for the 2011 graduate intake, which will open to applications in the autumn. Numbers are likely to remain stable, however, as the regulator's recruitment target for next year - 150 new hires - mirrors that of 2010.

While you're never likely to earn astronomical sums working for the regulator (Matthew Elderfield, its head of regulation, hauls in €340k), the appeal of working there is obvious.

Now that Ireland's banks are under increasing regulatory scrutiny and the Central Bank has now decidedly sharper teeth, the role is a rare beast at the moment - a stable career option.

There are also still relatively scant graduate opportunities in banking currently. Both AIB and Bank of Ireland (traditionally among the most voluminous recruiters) have postponed their graduate schemes for the second year running.

However, both KBC Ireland and Dexia Bank are taking on graduates this year, and fund administration firms like Bank of New York Mellon, Citco Fund Services and State Street are all back in the market for juniors.