AI increasingly shapes fintech jobs, research finds
Cyprus remained the leading global hiring hub for online trading firms as of July 14, 2026, with 226 vacancies, even as overall recruitment across the sector fell sharply, according to research by Cyprus-based marketing agency FYI.LTD.
The findings, based on 2,030 open positions at 92 crypto exchanges, CFD brokers and prop trading firms, show that Cyprus accounted for 11.1 per cent of all vacancies, putting it ahead of Singapore, Hong Kong and the United Arab Emirates.
The research also points to a gradual shift in the skills employers are seeking, with artificial intelligence increasingly appearing in job descriptions across the sector.
“Cyprus has been an operational hub for fintech companies for many years. As AI becomes more widely used, repetitive tasks and roles focused mainly on execution may come under pressure,” said Christian Görgen, founder of FYI.LTD and author of the research.
“But AI also creates new opportunities. With its experienced talent pool, international business community and relatively straightforward company setup, Cyprus has the potential to become a hub for AI start-ups,” he added.
Cyprus has long been a major centre for fintech and online trading companies, supported by its licensing environment, tax system and established pool of specialised workers.
The latest figures suggest that its importance to the sector remains strong despite a broader cooling in recruitment.
Open positions across the 92 companies fell from 2,772 in the second quarter to 2,030 in the third quarter, representing a decline of about 27 per cent.
The contraction was particularly pronounced among CFD brokers, where vacancies fell by about 36 per cent, while crypto hiring declined more moderately and prop trading firms increased recruitment from a relatively small base.
Cyprus accounted for a larger share of global vacancies than any other country, with Singapore at 9.1 per cent, Hong Kong at 6.4 per cent and the UAE at 5.8 per cent.
Australia accounted for 3.7 per cent, followed by the UK on 3.5 per cent, Malaysia on 3.2 per cent, Israel on 2.3 per cent, the US on 2.1 per cent and India on 1.8 per cent.
The research found that Cyprus was particularly important for CFD brokers, while Singapore and Hong Kong remained major centres for crypto exchanges.
The UAE has also emerged as a broader fintech centre, although FYI said hiring there appeared to have been affected to some extent by continuing instability in the Gulf region.
The UK, meanwhile, was described as gradually losing ground despite remaining an important financial centre, with much of the sector’s current expansion taking place elsewhere.
The nature of jobs being offered also challenges the traditional image of online trading employment in Cyprus as being dominated by sales teams.
IT was the largest hiring function in Cyprus, accounting for around 30 per cent of open positions in the country’s vacancies, according to the research.
Companies are seeking software engineers, automation specialists and trading-platform experts, alongside staff in operations, finance, risk and compliance.
Across the wider dataset, IT accounted for roughly one in five positions, partly reflecting the strong presence of crypto companies, while marketing, product, risk and compliance, finance and operations each accounted for close to 10 per cent.
The distribution suggests that online trading companies are recruiting across a broad range of functions rather than concentrating their expansion in a single area.
Business development managers were the most sought-after individual job title, reflecting companies’ efforts to enter new markets, establish partnerships and build distribution networks without necessarily committing immediately to a full local operation.
Such positions can include developing commercial relationships, identifying distribution partners and recruiting influencers and affiliates to increase a firm’s visibility in new markets.
Crypto exchange OKX was by far the largest recruiter in the research, with around 290 vacancies, followed by Coinbase and Bybit.
Among CFD brokers, XM and JustMarkets were among the most active recruiters, while prop trading firms generally operated with much smaller teams. FTMO and Topstep, the largest names in that segment, each listed only a couple of dozen positions.
The research also found that employers are increasingly looking for multilingual staff.
Chinese was the most requested additional language after English, appearing in 204 vacancies, or 10 per cent of the dataset.
Spanish was requested in 41 positions, followed by Russian and Arabic with 38 each, German with 36, French with 35, Portuguese with 32, Greek with 17, Vietnamese with 14 and Polish with nine.
English was treated as a baseline requirement in the analysis, meaning the figures reflected additional languages requested by employers.
The language requirements were seen as an indication of the markets companies are targeting, with Chinese demand driven particularly by crypto exchanges and a mixture of European and regional languages making up the remainder.
AI is also becoming a more common feature of recruitment.
References to artificial intelligence, machine learning or related technologies appeared in roughly one in three job advertisements across the sector.
The figure rose to about 46 per cent among crypto exchanges and stood at 22 per cent among CFD brokers.
In Cyprus, around one in five online trading vacancies mentioned AI, machine learning or related technologies.
That is below the global industry average of 35 per cent, but represents a growing presence of AI in everyday job requirements.
The shift is particularly relevant to technology roles, with employers increasingly expecting staff to be able to use AI tools rather than leaving the technology solely to specialist teams.
For workers in Cyprus, practical experience with AI could therefore become an increasingly important advantage.
At the same time, the research found no clear evidence that AI is already replacing junior workers on a large scale.
Junior and entry-level positions remained a small proportion of vacancies, accounting for under 8 per cent of openings, but their share actually edged upwards from the previous quarter and declined far less sharply than overall recruitment.
If AI were already substantially displacing entry-level work, the report argues, a different pattern would be expected.
Mid-level and senior positions together accounted for close to two-thirds of vacancies, while entry-level and junior jobs remained below one in 10, reflecting the sector’s preference for candidates with several years of experience.
The findings suggest that AI may therefore be changing the nature of work more quickly than it is reducing the number of jobs.
Repetitive tasks are likely to become increasingly automated, while workers may be expected to incorporate AI into their daily activities.
At the same time, the technology could generate additional demand for specialists in automation, data analysis, software development, AI governance and information security.
The trend is not confined to online trading.
Cyprus has seen growing interest in the commercial and practical applications of AI more broadly, including the AI Cyprus Expo held in Limassol in April 2026.
The Cyprus AI Expo subsequently took place in Larnaca in July, bringing together technology companies, researchers and investors to examine how AI is changing industries and the future of work.
The growth of such events reflects wider interest in developing an AI ecosystem on the island.
For Cyprus, the challenge will be to build on its established position as an online trading centre while developing a broader technology advantage.
That could require companies, universities and policymakers to place greater emphasis on practical AI skills and prepare workers for roles that are likely to evolve as adoption increases.
The report also found that working arrangements are changing.
About 15 per cent of vacancies were explicitly advertised as remote, slightly above the roughly 12 per cent classified as hybrid, while fully on-site positions represented the smallest explicitly stated category.
However, when no working arrangement was specified, this generally indicated an on-site role.
FYI said fully remote opportunities appeared to be declining and were increasingly being reserved for highly specialised roles or positions requiring language skills that might not be available close to a company’s main office.
Employee benefits remained relatively conventional, with bonuses, medical insurance and wellness benefits among the most frequently advertised perks, followed by learning budgets and competitive salaries.
The report described the packages as generally solid and competitive but rarely distinctive.
Pay transparency also remained limited despite new EU rules.
Only 2.2 per cent of job advertisements included a salary range, barely higher than the 2.1 per cent recorded in the second quarter.
FYI said enforcement of the EU pay-transparency directive was still being developed and national implementation varied, meaning the figure could change over coming quarters.
The research also examined how companies advertise their vacancies.
Job listings for 53 of the 92 firms were sourced through LinkedIn, while the remaining 39 used identifiable applicant tracking systems.
These included custom career sites, BambooHR and Greenhouse.
Large firms including Coinbase, Plus500, XTB and FTMO frequently used their own recruitment systems, while mid-sized brokers tended to favour BambooHR and high-volume crypto exchanges such as OKX, Bybit and BitMEX commonly used Greenhouse.
FYI said the report was based on career pages and LinkedIn listings collected from the 92 online trading companies, covering the 2,030 open roles available as of July 14, 2026.
Custom scrapers were used to collect the listings, after which AI models classified job descriptions according to seniority, department, languages, benefits and references to AI.
Görgen reviewed the resulting data, but the report cautioned that a dataset of this size could still contain errors.
The research also warned that hiring can change quickly and some companies block automated data collection, meaning the findings should be treated as a directional picture of the market rather than an exact measure of employment.
For now, the report suggests that the most visible impact of AI is not a dramatic reduction in the number of vacancies, but a change in what employers expect candidates to know and do.
For Cyprus, which remains the sector’s largest hiring location, that shift could determine whether the island’s established fintech workforce can retain its competitive advantage as online trading companies increasingly integrate AI into their operations.
