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Dublin's financial services accountancy professionals are being snapped up and enjoying big salary hikes.

Dublin's financial services accountancy professionals are being snapped up and enjoying big salary hikes, but over the water it's a different story. Hiring right across the board in London's City has stalled badly under the strain of the banking meltdown.

The number of job vacancies in the City of London plunged by more than a third this August compared to last year, research by recruiter Morgan McKinley showed.

The research was done in early September, before the collapse of Lehmann Brothers and the trademark cockiness of the City employee was in evidence, with the majority (63.5pc) expecting to get a similar or bigger bonus this year than last year and 42.5pc saying they would definitely change jobs if their bonus expectations were not met.

However, this week's events should make it easier for City employers to balance bonus expectations with dramatically reduced resources.

"Clearly bonus expectations for 2008 will be markedly reduced by the turmoil witnessed in the past few days," Robert Thesiger of Morgan McKinley predicted.

Back at home, the ongoing skills shortage in the Dublin financial services sector meant senior level qualified accountants scored salary hikes of €21,000 on average this year and were as much as 10pc better paid than their peers in other sectors, according to the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants salary survey for 2008.

The top money is earned by city-based financial directors in the corporate sector, who can command up to €500,000 per annum, a 20pc increase from 2007.

Roisin Burke