It really doesn't seem like nine months since we moved into our IFSC offices. It's amazing how quickly you settle in particularly when the working environment is such an improvement on what went before. Best of all, from my point of view, is the ease with which I can get home in the evenings.

Not having to wrestle my way through the gridlock of Pearse Street has done wonders for my stress levels and has kept me out of the news headlines as a perpetrator of a major road rage incident. It used to be a constant battle of wits to get home hard to know whether the markets or the car journey was the most stressful.

It's all changed now, though, even if I do have momentary twangs of guilt that I drive at all.

But I honestly can't face public transport in the hours before dawn. and I'm far too cranky to inflict my company on anyone before seven anyway. During the summer I tried cycling to work a few times, but every time I hopped on the bike torrential rain appeared from a previously cloudless blue sky.

And my ultra-trendy cycling helmet wasn't much protection against the downpour. So it was back behind the wheel again.

Over the past months, the IFSC has been in a constant state of change. We used to be the new kids on the block, the last building on the site, but not any more. In December, our nextdoor neighbours moved into their building (which was just foundations when we first arrived), and the queues in the sandwich bars get longer every day . . .

New flowers and shrubs are planted daily too although the wisdom of shoving down what looks like palm trees on the darkest days of December must be called into question still, if they survive the easterly winds currently whistling through the centre, they'll look fantastic in the summer.

The building development hasn't only been within the confines of the IFSC itself. There are apartments going up all around Amiens Street and Talbot Street, and the plans for the expansion of the Docklands right along the quays are breathtaking. It's all very exciting and Celtic Tigerish, so you have to hope that the economic conditions continue to support the scale of development that's going on around the city.

Market events in the last quarter rocked everyone back on their heels. I guess a lot of people felt that the worst was over when the Dow stabilised and bounced back above the 8000 level at the beginning of December. But the Asian woes are beginning to be felt in corporate profits, which has unnerved some participants again and left Korean debt looking like something particularly nasty that the cat dragged in.

I suppose the big story for 1998 will be EMU. It was pretty much the only story of 1997 until Asia came along, and it's going to be a major concern for everyone in European markets in the coming months. By May, we'll know for certain the participants in the first wave and the whole concept of individual countries and currencies will change completely.

There have been so many predictions and forecasts and "what if" scenarios postulated over the past few years it'll be interesting to see what actually happens. There are around 500 names licensed to operate out of the IFSC EMU is an opportunity as well as a challenge for everyone.

There are, of course, other opportunities within the centre. Particularly on the development front. Apparently something called Point Village is being proposed. I conducted an unscientific survey of ideas on how the amenities should be developed so this is a list of the current requirements: gym (you've got to be joking, do I want my clients to see me sweating feebly over a 4lb weight?; Belgian chocolate shop (sounds better to me); wine bar (a bit 1980s maybe?); shop that sells ladies tights (essential); more restaurants, more bars, clothes shops (men and women's); shoe shop; heel bar; hairdresser; computer shop; bookshop; burger joint; coffee shop (assorted varieties); and somewhere for blokes to get bunches of flowers or extravagant gifts because they've forgotten their wives/ girlfriends/mother's birthdays.

Not a comprehensive list, but one that covers most of life's little essentials, I think.

You'll notice that we've ignored the cultural aspect yet again. This is not deliberate I'm sure that whatever cultural project is selected will be welcomed by everyone. It's just that the people here tend to lean towards the capitalist, retail-driven environment.

Actually, another thing we definitely need for 1998 is more seating around the dock itself. On the few sunny days this summer (i.e. the ones where I didn't risk cycling to work), the wooden benches, particularly the southfacing wooden benches, were at a significant premium.

If you were lucky enough to find a vacant seat you were always aware that there were a selection of people waiting to pounce on it as soon as you stood up in a kind of outdoors musical chairs.

Mind you, the proximity to the Liffey means that sitting out with a selection of food is an invitation to the seagulls to forage so you run the risk of being dive-bombed by a digestively challenged bird.

Once you get used to the somewhat compound-like surroundings and the fact that you keep meeting the same people walking around the place every day, it's not a bad spot to be. Hopefully, there'll be enough market activity in the coming months to keep everybody busy and the Tiger can burn bright for another year or so.

In the meantime, I'm on the strict detox January diet. So basically the only additional facilities I need around here is a shop selling nothing but purified water and oxygen. Nobody mentioned such a facility to me in my research, but oxygen bars are the up and coming thing in the US. And where that bastion of free-markets leads, can the International Financial Services Centre be far behind?

Sheila O'Flanagan is a fixed-income specialist at NCB stockbrokers.