We are seeking a senior Financial Crime and Compliance Investigations practitioner to join our client in Sydney at Senior Director level. The ideal candidate will hold senior financial-crime credentials with at least 10 years of relevant experience, the most recent 3+ years at Director or equivalent senior-leadership level, and a track record of leading post-enforcement transaction look-back and sanctions-evasion investigations admissible in AUSTRAC / ASIC / DOJ / OFAC review. The successful candidate will lead the most complex multi-jurisdictional financial-crime matters, define the practice's investigations doctrine and signed-off declaration practice, carry a meaningful named-account pipeline across the Australian and Trans-Tasman financial-services and litigation-counsel landscape, and contribute to the practice's strategy as an emerging Partner-track operator.

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. 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:

• Lead high-stakes financial-crime investigations, typically running AUD 1m - 6m, often with Australia-NZ-PNG-APAC overlay, with full responsibility for engagement strategy, hypothesis design, transaction-data reconstruction, signed-off written deliverable and adversarial-context defensibility on bet-the-bank matters.
• Define the practice's investigations doctrine on AML / CTF, sanctions-evasion, market-abuse, TBML, anti-bribery and proliferation-financing fact patterns; set the bar for what is - and is not - defensible against AUSTRAC / ASIC / DOJ / OFAC challenge and class-action review.
• Lead the most complex Look-Back Reviews, Transaction Monitoring Look-Backs and Suspicious-Matter Investigations - notably the Westpac, CBA, NAB, Crown and Star pattern matters - including signed-off TML methodology, defensibility positioning and remediation-roadmap delivery.
• Take signed-off positions on sanctions-evasion attribution and trade-finance-forensic findings at instructing-counsel and regulator level; engage on disclosure-and-self-reporting positioning under the AML / CTF Act 2006, the Tranche-2-extension regime, the Combatting Foreign Bribery Act 2024 DPA-equivalent framework, and DFAT autonomous sanctions.
• Direct market-abuse and insider-trading investigations on the most complex ASX-listed populations, including spoofing, layering, wash-trading, front-running and Trans-Tasman counterparty layering.
• Develop and own a sustained pipeline of named accounts at General Counsel, Head of Financial Crime, MLRO, Chief Compliance Officer and Audit Committee Chair level, and at relevant law firm partner level; originate or co-originate AUD 1.5m+ annually in qualified financial-crime opportunities.
• Convert reactive case work into multi-year retainer engagements covering managed-investigations, ongoing-look-back-retainer, outsourced-MLRO, transaction-monitoring-tuning, sanctions-screening-validation and Tranche-2-readiness work for the new lawyers / accountants / real-estate population.
• Set methodology and tooling-strategy direction within the financial-crime sub-practice; directly supervise, mentor and advocate for Directors and Senior Managers - championing their advancement at promotion rounds, sponsoring sustained upskilling on emerging methodology and AI tooling, and shaping their external profile-building on investigations and signed-off declaration depth.

Required Qualifications and Skills:

• Multiple senior financial-crime credentials, such as CAMS plus CFE plus CGSS plus GIA, or CAMS-FCI plus CCFI plus qualified-lawyer status - typically multiple at this level.
• At least 10 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 Director or equivalent senior-leadership level.
• Demonstrable track record of leading bet-the-bank financial-crime matters with full investigations and signed-off written-deliverable responsibility under AUSTRAC / ASIC / DOJ / OFAC regulator review.
• Direct experience operating with General Counsel, Heads of Financial Crime, MLROs, Chief Compliance Officers, Audit Committee Chairs and Australian regulators (AUSTRAC, ASIC, ACCC, AFP, ACLEI, ATO).
• Working knowledge at supervisory-policy depth of 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.
• Authority on FATF Methodology and Recommendations, EU 4AMLD / 5AMLD / 6AMLD, US BSA / FinCEN / OFAC / DOJ enforcement pattern, UK MLRs 2017 and POCA 2002, and the Wolfsberg Group standards.
• Familiarity with industry-standard financial-crime tooling, including transaction-monitoring platforms (such as NICE Actimize, SAS AML, Oracle Mantas, Featurespace ARIC or Quantexa), name-screening platforms (such as Refinitiv World-Check One, Dow Jones Risk Center or LexisNexis Bridger), KYC / CLM platforms (such as Fenergo or Pega CLM), trade-surveillance platforms (such as NICE Actimize, NASDAQ SMARTS or Eventus Validus), and crypto-tracing platforms (such as Chainalysis, TRM Labs or Elliptic).
• Demonstrable history of converting financial-crime engagement relationships into multi-year managed-investigations, ongoing-look-back-retainer or outsourced-MLRO work.
• Established relationships with law firm partners in financial-services regulatory, regulatory enforcement, white-collar crime, internal-investigations and class-action / privacy-litigation practices who refer and instruct financial-crime investigations work; sustained named-account level engagement is the strongest evidence.
• High-agency operating style, calm and credible under regulator and adversarial-challenge pressure, with the methodological discipline to ensure findings are evidence-based, structured and defensible.

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.
• Postgraduate qualification: Master's in finance, law, public policy, governance, MBA, or LLM with regulatory / compliance / criminal-justice relevance.
• Cross-border investigations experience across Australia / NZ / PNG and the broader APAC region.
• Crypto-asset investigations and on-chain tracing experience at supervisory-policy level.
• Published authorship on financial-crime, AML, sanctions or market-abuse themes; conference-level speaking on financial-crime investigations.
• Track record of testifying or signed-off declaration on financial-crime issues in Australian-court, arbitration or AUSTRAC / ASIC regulator proceedings.
• Independent-monitor or outsourced-MLRO appointment track record.
• Growth-mindset operating posture and visible engagement with the AI developments reshaping financial-crime investigations: candidates who track tooling shifts (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), share that knowledge with the Director and Manager bench under their supervision, and have a track record of building team-upskilling programmes on emerging methodologies.

Compensation:

Competitive package commensurate with seniority and experience, including base, performance-based bonus, long-term incentives and (where applicable) partner-track equity participation.

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 contact from an experienced and specialist financial crime and compliance investigations recruitment consultant.

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.