30 skill sets that banks need most now

As 2015 moves into view, which skills are banks most in need of? Or, to put it another way, what should you be listing on your CV if you want to get hired in the next year?

We've looked at the skills that are being sought globally in the job listings on eFinancialCareers, and compared these to the skills mentioned on CVs uploaded to our global CV database over the past three months. The results are shown in the chart below.

As you can see, candidates always outnumber jobs, but for some skills the surplus is a lot lower than others. For example, simply listing 'modelling' as a skill on your CV will get you nowhere - there are 60 'modelling' CVs to each 'modelling' job. By comparison, there are 'only' 19 'financial modelling' CVs per 'financial modelling' job.

The hottest skill sets right now, however, are quantitative analytics and C# - for which there are 1.9 and 2.5 CVs per role respectively. C# is popular among banks upgrading their risk and trading systems, while quantitative analytics aptitude is increasingly necessary as banks move to automated trading and risk environments. Talent also looks tight globally in securitisation. Banks like Credit Suisse are rebuilding their securitisation businesses, and in the past six years a lot of securitisation professionals have quit finance altogether.

Other notable pinch points include surveillance - which looks set to become a hotter area following the FX scandal, along with regulatory reporting as banks try to stay on top of regulators' edicts.