We are seeking a Partner-grade Financial Crime and Compliance Investigations practitioner to join our client in Sydney. The ideal candidate will hold senior financial-crime credentials with at least 15 years of relevant experience, the most recent 3+ years at Partner, Managing Director or equivalent practice-leadership level, and a market reputation as a financial-crime investigations and AML / sanctions authority under the post-Westpac, post-Crown / Star and Tranche-2-extension enforcement landscape. The successful candidate will have a portable book of senior client and law-firm-partner relationships, a sustained personally-originated financial-crime revenue track record, and the brand presence to lead a financial-crime-investigations practice in the Sydney market. They will be responsible for taking signed-off Partner positions on the most complex bank-monitorship and post-enforcement matters, leading the highest-profile multi-jurisdictional investigations end to end, originating and growing Partner-instructed mandates, and setting practice strategy on hiring, pricing and methodology.

Confidential Client. Applying to this position means that you are interested to have an initial confidential discussion about how we can help you to identify and join a new financial crime and compliance investigations practice at Partner level. With your authorisation we will exclusively run the entire application and recruitment process for you, keeping you apprised at every step. With over 30 years' combined experience of helping the most talented financial-crime practitioners to make safe exits to launch rewarding new careers, we have the experience, network and ability to help you.

Key Responsibilities:

• Take signed-off Partner positions on the most complex financial-crime investigations - high-stakes, often privileged, often regulator-and-class-action-facing engagements running AUD 2m - 18m+ in fees - with full P&L responsibility for the financial-crime engagement portfolio.
• Originate, win and grow Partner-instructed financial-crime mandates by carrying a portable book of senior relationships at General Counsel, Head of Financial Crime, MLRO, Chief Compliance Officer and Audit Committee Chair level, and at relevant law firm partner level.
• Convert reactive case work into multi-year retainer engagements covering managed-investigations, ongoing-look-back-retainer, outsourced-MLRO, transaction-monitoring-tuning, sanctions-screening-validation, Tranche-2-readiness for the new lawyers / accountants / real-estate population, and crypto-asset investigations work; build the practice's standing-monitor book.
• Take Partner-level signed-off positions on independent compliance monitor reports for AML / sanctions matters, DPA-equivalent annual attestations under the Combatting Foreign Bribery Act 2024, transaction-monitoring tuning validation and ongoing investigations attestations; serve as Partner before AUSTRAC, ASIC, ACCC, AFP, ACLEI, ATO, the Federal Court of Australia and as forensic adviser to Royal Commissions and Commissions of Inquiry where required.
• Lead the most complex multi-jurisdictional financial-crime investigations - notably the post-Westpac, CBA, NAB, Crown and Star pattern matters, sanctions-evasion case work touching Russia / Iran / North-Korea / Myanmar, and cross-border market-abuse investigations linking ASX, NZX, the LSE and NASDAQ / NYSE.
• Set the practice's strategy on tooling adoption (such as NICE Actimize / Quantexa / Featurespace / Chainalysis stacks and the AI-assisted-monitoring frontier), hiring, pricing and market positioning; shape the firm's signed-off attestation doctrine and crypto-asset investigations capability.
• Build the practice's external IP and brand presence on financial-crime themes through published thought leadership and conference-level speaking engagements; pursue and maintain ACAMS / ICA / GIA / Wolfsberg Group / FATF expert positioning where applicable.
• Hire, develop, mentor and advocate for the practice staff - Senior Directors, Directors, Senior Managers and the wider bench - championing advancement at firm-wide promotion rounds, sponsoring sustained upskilling on emerging methodology and AI tooling, and shaping their external profile-building. Contribute to firm strategy beyond the financial-crime sub-practice.

Required Qualifications and Skills:

• Multiple senior financial-crime credentials, such as CAMS plus CFE plus CGSS plus GIA, or qualified-lawyer status with regulatory specialisation plus CAMS-FCI plus CCFI - the recognised stacking pattern at Partner level.
• At least 15 years of relevant experience in financial-crime investigations, AML / CTF remediation, sanctions case work, market-abuse investigations or qualified-legal practice, with the most recent 3+ years at Partner, Managing Director or equivalent practice-leadership level.
• Demonstrable track record of leading the most complex regional financial-crime matters with full P&L accountability and signed-off Partner-level attestations under regulator and class-action review.
• Demonstrable, sustained, personally-originated financial-crime revenue track record. Sydney market guide: AUD 2m - 4m+ annually originated on financial-crime investigations and managed-monitorship work, calibrated to the engaging firm.
• Portable senior client relationships at General Counsel, Head of Financial Crime, MLRO, Chief Compliance Officer, Chief Risk Officer and Audit Committee Chair level, and at relevant law firm partner level (financial-services regulatory, regulatory enforcement, white-collar crime, internal-investigations and class-action / privacy-litigation practices) who refer and instruct financial-crime investigations work - credibly portable subject to non-compete and non-solicit posture; named accounts with multi-year history are the strongest evidence.
• Experience running a financial-crime sub-practice or country-team P&L: revenue, utilisation, gross margin, partner-time leverage, hire-and-promote responsibility, monitor-panel positioning.
• Authority on the Australian financial-crime framework: the AML / CTF Act 2006 and Tranche-2-extension regime, the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 (Cth), the Criminal Code (Cth) cross-border bribery framework and Combatting Foreign Bribery Act 2024, ASIC market-misconduct provisions and Insider-Trading framework, the Defence Trade Controls Act 2012, AUSTRAC enforcement-decision pattern at post-Westpac / Crown / Star depth, and the ATO related-party / transfer-pricing investigations framework.
• Cross-border fluency on FATF, EU 4AMLD / 5AMLD / 6AMLD, US BSA / FinCEN / OFAC / DOJ enforcement pattern, UK MLRs 2017 / POCA 2002, Singapore CDSA / MAS Notices, Hong Kong AMLO 2024 amendments and the Wolfsberg Group standards.
• Familiarity with industry-standard financial-crime tooling at Partner-policy depth, including transaction-monitoring (NICE Actimize, SAS AML, Oracle Mantas, Featurespace ARIC, Quantexa), screening (Refinitiv World-Check One, Dow Jones Risk Center, LexisNexis Bridger), KYC / CLM (Fenergo, Pega CLM), trade-surveillance (NICE Actimize, NASDAQ SMARTS, Eventus Validus), and crypto-tracing (Chainalysis, TRM Labs, Elliptic).
• Realistic engagement on notice periods and non-compete / non-solicit obligations given the senior nature of the move and the relationship-led nature of the practice.

Preferred Experience:

• Prior regulator alumni status at AUSTRAC, ASIC, ACCC, AFP, ATO, or international peers (FCA / SEC / DOJ / FinCEN / OFAC / SFO).
• Royal Commission or Commission-of-Inquiry advisor experience at Partner level.
• Independent-monitor or outsourced-MLRO appointment track record at Partner level.
• FATF Mutual Evaluation expert participation or Wolfsberg Group working-group positioning.
• Postgraduate qualification: Master's in finance, law, public policy, governance, MBA, or LLM with regulatory / compliance / criminal-justice relevance.
• Visible market profile in the Australian / Trans-Tasman financial-crime community: published author, conference speaker, recognised authority on AML, sanctions, market-abuse or crypto-asset themes, named in legal and compliance directories.
• Track record of testifying or signed-off declaration on financial-crime issues in Australian-court, Royal Commission, arbitration or AUSTRAC / ASIC regulator proceedings.
• Demonstrable conversion of one-off engagements into multi-year monitorship and standing-retainer work.
• Visible thought leadership on the AI developments reshaping financial-crime investigations and a documented growth-mindset operating posture: candidates who set the practice direction on tooling adoption (such as Quantexa contextual decisioning, Featurespace ARIC adaptive behavioural analytics, AI-driven sanctions-screening enrichment under DFAT autonomous and OFAC sectoral regimes, or ML typology detection on TBML populations under the AUSTRAC Tranche-2-extension perimeter), advocate for and develop their practice staff on emerging methodologies, and have a track record of upskilling-programme delivery within the sub-practice.

Compensation:

Partner-level package commensurate with origination, portable book and seniority. Includes base, profit-share / partnership-distribution, equity participation and long-term incentive arrangements.

Next Steps:

This opportunity is open to Australian citizens, permanent residents and qualified candidates with relevant Australian work-rights status who match the above criteria. Please apply to receive prompt confidential contact from an experienced and specialist financial crime and compliance investigations recruitment Partner.

Search & Counsel is a trading style of Feltan Associates Pte Ltd; an international Executive Search, Recruitment and Consulting business based in Singapore, licensed and regulated by the Singapore Ministry of Manpower to conduct recruitment services for clients. UEN: 202225620G. EA Licence 23S1672. All rights reserved.