General Information

• Type of contract: Traineeship
• Who can apply?: EU nationals eligible for our traineeship programme
• Grant: The trainee grant is €1,170 per month plus an accommodation allowance (see further information section)
• Working time: Full time
• Place of work: Frankfurt am Main, Germany
• Closing date: 25.03.2025

Your team

You will be part of the Directorate Risk Management, a dynamic team of professionals developing and maintaining the financial risk management frameworks that govern the Eurosystem’s monetary policy operations and the ECB’s investment operations. The Directorate helps the ECB to achieve operational resilience by implementing sound practices covering non-financial risk, business continuity and critical incident management.

You will be working in one of the Directorate’s two divisions, both of which deal with financial risk management issues:

• Risk Analysis monitors the compliance of monetary policy and investment operations with their respective risk management frameworks. It also models, analyses and reports on financial risks.
• Risk Strategy designs and maintains the risk management frameworks and policies governing Eurosystem credit operations and non-standard monetary policy measures.

In your role as a trainee in the Directorate Risk Management, you will gain hands-on experience of the IT applications, tools and databases that are used to analyse credit risk, market risk and other types of risk (such as climate-related risk) related to issuers of financial instruments and the Eurosystem’s counterparties.

You will also work closely with colleagues from different teams within the Directorate and other ECB business areas, in particular the Directorate General Market Operations and the Directorate General Information Systems.

The ECB is an inclusive employer and we strive to reflect the diversity of the population we serve. We encourage you to apply irrespective of age, disability, ethnicity, gender, gender identity, race, religious beliefs, sexual orientation or other characteristics.

Your role

As a trainee in the Risk Analysis Division you will:

• learn about the different risk management frameworks that govern the ECB’s asset purchase programmes and the management of the ECB’s foreign reserves and investment portfolios;
• contribute to monitoring and reporting tasks that are performed on a daily, weekly and monthly basis;
• collect and process data used in our regular financial risk management tasks;
• participate in projects and conduct ad hoc analyses to further improve financial risk management processes.

As a trainee in the Risk Strategy Division you will:

• learn about the risk management policies and frameworks governing the Eurosystem’s credit operations and non-standard monetary policy measures, including eligibility requirements, valuations and haircuts;
• contribute to assessing and mitigating credit risk, market risk and climate-related risk in the Eurosystem’s credit operations;
• perform regular monitoring and reporting tasks and ad hoc analyses to enhance financial risk management processes;
• collect and process data used in our regular financial risk management tasks;
• contribute to presentations and documentation for Eurosystem committee and working group meetings.

The position offers you excellent opportunities to learn more about financial risk management at the ECB and how the Eurosystem functions. You will be part of a multicultural team that strives for continuous innovation to make a positive impact on the lives of European citizens.

Qualifications, experience and skills

• a bachelor’s degree or higher in finance, economics, business administration, STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) or another relevant field;
• a keen interest in financial risk management and monetary policy;
• the ability to process, analyse, interpret and visualise data;
• familiarity with one or more of the following tools: Python, MATLAB, SQL, Stata, R, Java, C, Ruby, VBA, Tableau;
• a good knowledge of the Microsoft Office package;
• an advanced (C1) command of English and an intermediate (B1) command of at least one other official language of the EU, according to the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages.

You are curious and eager to learn, and want to further develop your ability to analyse complex information. You are keen to collaborate with others, pursue team goals and learn from other people’s diverse perspectives. You strive to know and anticipate stakeholder needs, and will signal any need for change and propose alternative solutions.

You are motivated to contribute to the ECB’s mission, to serve the citizens of the EU as a member of a public institution and to work with colleagues from all over Europe. You are keen to be part of our team and to use your skills and competencies to achieve the aims of this position.

Further information

Initial traineeship of 6 months, with a possible extension to up to 12 months in total. Different starting dates are possible from 1 July 2025.

Other details on the conditions applicable to traineeships at the ECB can be found on our website.

Application and selection process

The recruitment process for this position will include a remote written exercise in the pre-selection phase and – if you are invited to participate in the subsequent selection phase – an online interview. 

Further information on how to apply is available on our website.

If you are not selected for this position but are still considered suitable, you will be placed on a reserve list for 12 months from the closing date for applications, from which you might be considered for other traineeship positions within the ECB.