Product teams remain central to fintech strategy, but hiring patterns across Europe show a clear shift in how companies build and scale product functions. This report analyzes product hiring across 25 leading fintech and payments companies between January 2025 and January 2026, offering a detailed look at where demand exists, and where it has slowed.
Using LinkedIn hiring data, the analysis distinguishes between Product Individual Contributors (Product Managers and Senior PMs) and Product Leadership roles (CPOs, VPs, Heads of Product). The findings show that product roles accounted for just over 2% of total hiring, with demand heavily skewed toward execution-focused ICs rather than leadership expansion. Leadership hiring remained limited, signalling stable org structures and a stronger focus on delivery and efficiency.
The report also highlights geographic concentration, with nearly two-thirds of product hires located in the UK and the Netherlands, and shows how VC-backed fintechs continue to hire more aggressively in product than the broader market. Finally, it explores how AI is reshaping product roles, not reducing headcount, but increasing demand for technically fluent PMs who can work closely with engineering and platform teams. For CPOs, founders, and product leaders, this report offers a grounded view of how product hiring is evolving in a more disciplined fintech market.