2024 graduate navigating graduate eligibility restrictions

Would appreciate some advice from people who have seen similar situations in London / Europe.

I graduated in 2024 from a top European school and recently completed a long-awaited off-cycle internship at a BB, but unfortunately did not receive a return offer.

I am now looking for another opportunity in IB, but I am running into following issue: a lot of off-cycle internships and graduate programmes currently require candidates to graduate no earlier than January 2026, which effectively makes me ineligible despite having relevant experience.

A few questions:

• Has anyone successfully navigated this situation after being 1–2 years out of university?
• Is enrolling in another Master’s / postgraduate programme a legitimate way to become eligible for internships again? If so, are there relatively inexpensive ways of doing this rather than spending a bank on a degree purely for recruiting eligibility?
• Are there particular banks, boutiques or geographies that tend to be more flexible on graduation-date requirements?
• At this stage, is it more realistic to focus exclusively on lateral Analyst roles rather than internships / graduate programmes? The rest of my experience is at lesser-known corporate finance roles, so I am not sure how competitive I would be for lateral hiring.

Would especially appreciate perspectives from people who missed the standard graduate recruiting window and managed to find their way back into IB.

I do not want this to come across as overly pessimistic, and I know I will ultimately be fine, but I would be lying if I said the situation was not getting frustrating. Most of my close peers are now Analysts 2–3 or even Associates, while I still feel like I am trying to get onto the starting line applying to internships. Mainly trying to understand what the most rational strategy is from here.