Derivative Contract Job Trends

Derivatives
UK

The table below looks at the prevalence of the term Derivative in contract job vacancies. Included is a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited Derivative over the 6 months leading up to 25 June 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
25 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 387 225 206
Rank change year-on-year -162 -19 +8
Contract jobs citing Derivative 262 350 497
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.51% 1.16% 1.14%
As % of the Miscellaneous category 1.57% 3.36% 3.80%
Number of daily rates quoted 162 305 441
10th Percentile £450 £537 £588
25th Percentile £581 £638 £663
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £725 £725 £800
Median % change year-on-year - -9.38% +10.34%
75th Percentile £850 £874 £875
90th Percentile £918 £938 £888
UK excluding London median daily rate £613 £425 £638
% change year-on-year +44.12% -33.33% -20.31%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1 1 0
10th Percentile - - -
25th Percentile £56.25 £86.25 -
Median hourly rate £57.50 £87.50 -
Median % change year-on-year -34.29% - -
75th Percentile £58.75 £88.75 -
90th Percentile - - -
UK excluding London median hourly rate - - -

All Generic Skills
UK

Derivative falls under the General and Transferable Skills category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring generic IT skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for generic IT skills 16,681 10,414 13,091
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 32.78% 34.58% 30.05%
Number of daily rates quoted 10,228 6,516 8,302
10th Percentile £313 £300 £276
25th Percentile £413 £406 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £520 £525 £538
Median % change year-on-year -0.95% -2.42% -2.18%
75th Percentile £630 £650 £663
90th Percentile £750 £775 £800
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 861 464 940
10th Percentile £16.01 £15.84 £12.25
25th Percentile £21.00 £19.97 £15.39
Median hourly rate £42.50 £32.05 £36.00
Median % change year-on-year +32.61% -10.97% +60.11%
75th Percentile £70.00 £58.75 £62.00
90th Percentile £86.00 £80.70 £72.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £43.96 £31.63 £35.65
% change year-on-year +39.00% -11.29% +62.05%

Derivative
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Derivative relative to all contract IT jobs advertised.

Derivative job vacancy trend in the UK

Derivative
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Derivative.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Derivative

Derivative
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Derivative over the 6 months to 25 June 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Derivative in the UK

Derivative
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Derivative.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Derivative

Derivative
Top 8 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Derivative within the UK over the 6 months to 25 June 2026. The 'Rank Change' column provides an indication of the change in demand within each location based on the same 6 month period last year.

Location Rank Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Matching
Contract
IT Job Ads
Median
Daily Rate
Past 6 Months
Median Daily Rate
% Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Live
Jobs
England -163 241 £725 -3.33% 21
London -84 235 £725 -3.33% 20
Work from Home -136 85 £800 +10.34% 13
UK excluding London -127 21 £613 +44.12% 6
Scotland -5 15 £460 +13.86%
Yorkshire -52 4 £725 - 1
North of England -79 4 £725 +20.23% 2
Northern Ireland -11 2 £625 +53.37% 1

Derivative
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities by Category

The following tables expand on the one above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. They cover the same employment type, locality and period, with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each category:

Application Platforms
1 4 (1.53%) Confluence
2 1 (0.38%) Apache Spark
2 1 (0.38%) Microsoft Exchange
2 1 (0.38%) Oracle SOA Suite
2 1 (0.38%) SharePoint
2 1 (0.38%) WebSphere
Applications
1 6 (2.29%) Microsoft Excel
2 5 (1.91%) MS Visio
3 2 (0.76%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 1 (0.38%) Microsoft Office
Business Applications
1 9 (3.44%) Aladdin
2 6 (2.29%) Summit
3 5 (1.91%) Loan IQ
4 3 (1.15%) Advent Geneva
4 3 (1.15%) Orchestrade
4 3 (1.15%) Temenos T24
5 2 (0.76%) Front Arena
5 2 (0.76%) Global One
5 2 (0.76%) Oracle General Ledger
5 2 (0.76%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
6 1 (0.38%) Bloomberg AIM
6 1 (0.38%) Oracle FAH
6 1 (0.38%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
Cloud Services
1 43 (16.41%) AWS
2 38 (14.50%) Azure
3 28 (10.69%) GCP
4 11 (4.20%) ChatGPT
5 9 (3.44%) Anthropic Claude
6 8 (3.05%) GitHub
6 8 (3.05%) GitHub Copilot
6 8 (3.05%) Power Platform
7 4 (1.53%) SaaS
8 3 (1.15%) Azure DevOps
8 3 (1.15%) Microsoft Copilot
8 3 (1.15%) Snowflake
9 2 (0.76%) Collibra
9 2 (0.76%) Google Kubernetes Engine
10 1 (0.38%) IaaS
10 1 (0.38%) npm
10 1 (0.38%) OpenShift
10 1 (0.38%) PaaS
10 1 (0.38%) Serverless
10 1 (0.38%) Yarn
Communications & Networking
1 19 (7.25%) FIX Connectivity
2 8 (3.05%) HTTP
3 1 (0.38%) RTMP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 28 (10.69%) PostgreSQL
2 25 (9.54%) Relational Database
3 20 (7.63%) Metadata
4 18 (6.87%) MongoDB
4 18 (6.87%) SQL Server
5 15 (5.73%) Redis
6 10 (3.82%) Db2
6 10 (3.82%) RDBMS
7 8 (3.05%) Power BI
7 8 (3.05%) Tableau
8 6 (2.29%) Data Warehouse
9 4 (1.53%) Data Lake
9 4 (1.53%) NoSQL
10 2 (0.76%) Crystal Reports
10 2 (0.76%) KDB
10 2 (0.76%) Kdb+
10 2 (0.76%) Power Query
10 2 (0.76%) Snowflake Schema
10 2 (0.76%) SQL Server Reporting Services
11 1 (0.38%) Data Mining
Development Applications
1 16 (6.11%) JIRA
2 11 (4.20%) Git
2 11 (4.20%) Octopus Deploy
3 8 (3.05%) TeamCity
4 4 (1.53%) ER Studio
4 4 (1.53%) ERwin
4 4 (1.53%) PowerDesigner
5 2 (0.76%) Bitbucket
5 2 (0.76%) Jenkins
5 2 (0.76%) VTune
6 1 (0.38%) Eclipse
6 1 (0.38%) GitLab
6 1 (0.38%) GoogleTest
6 1 (0.38%) Gradle
6 1 (0.38%) IntelliJ
6 1 (0.38%) Maven
6 1 (0.38%) NUnit
6 1 (0.38%) REST Assured
6 1 (0.38%) Visual Studio
6 1 (0.38%) webpack
General
1 168 (64.12%) Finance
2 139 (53.05%) Banking
3 136 (51.91%) Front Office
4 114 (43.51%) Investment Banking
5 69 (26.34%) Social Skills
6 40 (15.27%) Analytical Skills
7 9 (3.44%) Back Office
7 9 (3.44%) Legal
8 7 (2.67%) Financial Institution
9 4 (1.53%) Influencing Skills
9 4 (1.53%) Presentation Skills
9 4 (1.53%) Private Banking
10 3 (1.15%) General Ledger
11 2 (0.76%) Public Sector
11 2 (0.76%) Spanish Language
12 1 (0.38%) Inclusion and Diversity
12 1 (0.38%) Japanese Language
12 1 (0.38%) Organisational Skills
Job Titles
1 138 (52.67%) Developer
2 64 (24.43%) Analyst
3 58 (22.14%) Business Analyst
4 42 (16.03%) Senior
5 39 (14.89%) Java Developer
6 38 (14.50%) Python Developer
7 31 (11.83%) C# Developer
8 26 (9.92%) Front Office Developer
8 26 (9.92%) Lead
9 24 (9.16%) Software Engineer
10 21 (8.02%) Electronic Trading Developer
11 20 (7.63%) Algorithmic Trading Developer
11 20 (7.63%) Java Developer - Algorithmic Trading
12 19 (7.25%) Electronic Trading Java Developer
12 19 (7.25%) Lead Developer
12 19 (7.25%) Low Latency Java Developer
13 15 (5.73%) Senior Developer
14 14 (5.34%) Lead Software Engineer
15 13 (4.96%) Derivatives Business Analyst
15 13 (4.96%) Python Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 42 (16.03%) React
2 35 (13.36%) FIX Protocol
3 18 (6.87%) Redux
4 16 (6.11%) .NET
4 16 (6.11%) Node.js
4 16 (6.11%) WebSockets
5 14 (5.34%) Kafka
6 9 (3.44%) NumPy
7 8 (3.05%) AngularJS
7 8 (3.05%) REST
7 8 (3.05%) RESTful
7 8 (3.05%) RxJava
7 8 (3.05%) Spring
7 8 (3.05%) XML
8 6 (2.29%) Django
8 6 (2.29%) FastAPI
8 6 (2.29%) HTML
8 6 (2.29%) HTML5
8 6 (2.29%) Middleware
8 6 (2.29%) Pandas
Miscellaneous
1 80 (30.53%) Equities
2 57 (21.76%) Fixed Income
3 53 (20.23%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
4 40 (15.27%) Equity Derivative
5 21 (8.02%) Market Risk
6 20 (7.63%) TWAP
6 20 (7.63%) VWAP
7 18 (6.87%) Credit Risk
8 17 (6.49%) Data Structures
8 17 (6.49%) Distributed Systems
9 16 (6.11%) OTC Derivatives
10 14 (5.34%) Algorithms
10 14 (5.34%) Data Protection Act
10 14 (5.34%) Hedge funds
11 13 (4.96%) Management Information System
12 11 (4.20%) Exotic Derivative
13 8 (3.05%) Reference Data
14 7 (2.67%) Credit Derivative
15 6 (2.29%) Product Ownership
16 5 (1.91%) Onboarding
Operating Systems
1 17 (6.49%) Unix
2 7 (2.67%) Linux
3 2 (0.76%) Windows
4 1 (0.38%) Windows Server
Processes & Methodologies
1 70 (26.72%) Agile
2 52 (19.85%) Problem-Solving
3 48 (18.32%) Low Latency
4 44 (16.79%) Electronic Trading
5 41 (15.65%) Multithreading
6 40 (15.27%) Risk Management
7 37 (14.12%) Software Engineering
7 37 (14.12%) TDD
8 36 (13.74%) CI/CD
9 34 (12.98%) Asset Management
10 32 (12.21%) User Acceptance Testing
11 29 (11.07%) Algorithmic Trading
11 29 (11.07%) Full-Stack Development
12 27 (10.31%) Analytics
12 27 (10.31%) DevOps
12 27 (10.31%) Microservices
13 26 (9.92%) Computer Science
14 24 (9.16%) Data Analysis
14 24 (9.16%) Stakeholder Management
14 24 (9.16%) Validation
Programming Languages
1 109 (41.60%) Python
2 93 (35.50%) SQL
3 81 (30.92%) Java
4 56 (21.37%) C#
5 39 (14.89%) TypeScript
6 35 (13.36%) C++
7 24 (9.16%) JavaScript
8 13 (4.96%) Rust
9 7 (2.67%) PowerShell
10 6 (2.29%) Shell Script
11 5 (1.91%) Perl
12 4 (1.53%) PL/SQL
12 4 (1.53%) Scala
13 2 (0.76%) F#
14 1 (0.38%) Bash
14 1 (0.38%) C
14 1 (0.38%) Korn
14 1 (0.38%) R
14 1 (0.38%) T-SQL
14 1 (0.38%) VBA
Qualifications
1 29 (11.07%) Degree
2 19 (7.25%) Computer Science Degree
3 10 (3.82%) Master's Degree
4 7 (2.67%) PhD
5 2 (0.76%) Numerate Degree
6 1 (0.38%) FFIEC
6 1 (0.38%) ISTQB
6 1 (0.38%) PMI Certification
6 1 (0.38%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 15 (5.73%) Data Quality
2 14 (5.34%) QA
3 8 (3.05%) EMIR
4 7 (2.67%) MiFID
5 6 (2.29%) IFRS
6 4 (1.53%) GAAP
7 3 (1.15%) Basel III
8 2 (0.76%) COREP
8 2 (0.76%) FINREP
9 1 (0.38%) Dodd-Frank
9 1 (0.38%) IFRS 17
9 1 (0.38%) IFRS 9
9 1 (0.38%) ISO 20022
9 1 (0.38%) PMO
9 1 (0.38%) Sarbanes-Oxley
System Software
1 18 (6.87%) Docker
Systems Management
1 6 (2.29%) Kubernetes
2 3 (1.15%) Control-M
2 3 (1.15%) Grafana
2 3 (1.15%) Prometheus
2 3 (1.15%) Terraform
3 2 (0.76%) ITRS Geneos
Vendors
1 21 (8.02%) Murex
2 16 (6.11%) Oracle
3 13 (4.96%) Bloomberg
4 10 (3.82%) Sybase
5 8 (3.05%) IBM
6 6 (2.29%) Calypso
6 6 (2.29%) Charles River
7 5 (1.91%) Google
8 4 (1.53%) Microsoft
9 3 (1.15%) Advent
9 3 (1.15%) Apple
9 3 (1.15%) Databricks
9 3 (1.15%) jBASE
9 3 (1.15%) Temenos
10 2 (0.76%) Reuters
11 1 (0.38%) Ab Initio
11 1 (0.38%) Informatica
11 1 (0.38%) ION Trading
11 1 (0.38%) SAP
11 1 (0.38%) SimCorp