Senior Counsel - Product Legal

About Airwallex

Airwallex is the AI-native financial operating system for a real-time, intelligent economy. More than 675,000 businesses, including McLaren Racing, Qantas, SHEIN, and TikTok, use us, directly or through our platform partners, to run their financial operations or build and monetize financial products of their own.

We started in Melbourne in 2015 to build the infrastructure global commerce runs on. We're the regulated backbone behind global payments: not by accident, but by design. A decade plus, 85+ licenses, and a financial infrastructure spanning North America, Europe, the Middle East, and Asia-Pacific.

We're co-headquartered in San Francisco and Singapore, with more than 2,700 people across 27 offices. We hire builders with founder-level energy, people who move fast with good judgment, dig in with real curiosity, and make calls from first principles rather than waiting to be told what to do. Read our operating principles to see it in full.

How You’ll Make an Impact

In this role, you will be the lead counsel for Airwallex’s Yield investment product. You will help scale the product by providing legal, regulatory and strategic advice on the Yield product lifecycle, including product design, licensing, securities and investment regulation, regulatory engagement (SEC, FINRA, MAS, ASIC and other regulators), partner arrangements (broker-dealers, custodians, fund managers and investment advisers), customer terms, disclosures, launch execution and product integration. You will have multi-regional responsibility by supporting the Yield product team globally, including in Singapore, the United States, Canada, Australia and Europe.

This dynamic role is ideal for someone who enjoys wearing multiple hats and solving complex issues for our clients, is detail oriented and commercially-minded, is willing to take on challenges and adapt to changes, is obsessively curious and intellectually honest, thrives on taking actions and delivering impactful results, and aims to inspire and be inspired.

• Own legal for Yield end to end and support the global Yield team from ideation through launch, market expansion, and ongoing changes.

• Give Product fast, clear answers by saying yes, no, or “here’s the path,” and explain why so the team learns as it goes.

• Open new markets and work out what it takes to launch Yield, or an equivalent investment, brokerage or money market fund product, in each new jurisdiction, alongside local regulatory colleagues and external counsel (including licensing, registration and securities-law analysis).

• Turn regulation into a product and convert cross-jurisdictional requirements into product requirements, customer terms, disclosures, investor eligibility and suitability criteria, marketing and advertising review, and launch-readiness materials.

• Build for scale by creating playbooks, launching checklists, and governance processes (including product governance, supervisory procedures and regulatory-change management) so each new market moves faster than the last.

• Be the go-to expert and build trusted relationships across Product, Regulatory Legal, Compliance, Licensing, Risk, Product Marketing, Operations, and our regulated partners.

• Work as one global team and coordinate advice across Singapore, the US, Canada, Australia, Europe, and other markets, including with product leaders in Australia.

What we’re looking for

Essentials

• Qualified lawyer (Singapore or common law jurisdiction), JD, or equivalent law degree

• 7+ years of post-qualification legal experience, including experience at a top-tier law firm or in a comparable financial-services legal environment.

• Strong regulatory advisory and/or product counselling experience for financial institutions, financial regulation, or fintechs, ideally in securities, investment management or wealth management regulation.

• Proven experience of being a solution-orientated lawyer who enjoys working strategically with non-lawyers to support commercial end-results

Preferred

• In-house experience at a fintech, financial services, asset management, fund management, brokerage firm, or other regulated financial services environment.

• Experience advising on investment products and funds, brokerage account setup and regulation, discretionary or non-discretionary management (including registered investment adviser (RIA) arrangements),broker-dealer arrangements, custodial relationships, SEC regulation, investment-management structures including a US broker-dealer or FINRA-regulated arrangement, or the equivalent elsewhere (e.g., AFSL, MAS CMS licensing, MiFID II, NI 31-103).

• Experience working with banks, broker-dealers, custodians, investment managers, transfer agents, fund administrators or other regulated partners.

• Familiarity with the following: Investment Advisers Act, Securities Act, Securities Exchange Act, Investment Company Act (including Rule 2a-7 and money market funds), Regulation Best Interest, Form CRS/ADV, FINRA rules, SEC marketing and custody rules, investor eligibility and suitability requirements, AML/KYC and BSA obligations, and related regulatory frameworks.

• Experience building playbooks, product-governance processes, or market expansion processes.

• Strong communication and stakeholder skills across global Product, Compliance, Risk, Operations, Marketing, external counsel, and regulated partners.

• The ability to own complex, cross-jurisdictional workstreams from ideation through launch.

• Experience operating in environments with high standards, fast iteration cycles and evolving priorities, with a curious, collaborative and ownership-oriented approach

Learn more about your team

Airwallex’s Product Legal Team works across the business on the development and launch of cutting-edge products in existing and new markets. The team plays a critical part in supporting the continued development of Airwallex’s suite of products and ensuring that products are launched in compliance with local legal and regulatory requirements across securities, payments and financial services regimes.

Applicant Safety Policy: Fraud and Third-Party Recruiters

To protect you from recruitment scams, please be aware that Airwallex will not ask for bank details, sensitive ID numbers (i.e. passport), or any form of payment during the application or interview process. All official communication will come from an @airwallex.com email address. Please apply only through careers.airwallex.com or our official LinkedIn page.

Airwallex does not accept unsolicited resumes from search firms/recruiters. Airwallex will not pay any fees to search firms/recruiters if a candidate is submitted by a search firm/recruiter unless an agreement has been entered into with respect to specific open position(s). Search firms/recruiters submitting resumes to Airwallex on an unsolicited basis shall be deemed to accept this condition, regardless of any other provision to the contrary.

Equal opportunity

Airwallex is proud to be an equal opportunity employer. We value diversity and anyone seeking employment at Airwallex is considered based on merit, qualifications, competence and talent. We don’t regard color, religion, race, national origin, sexual orientation, ancestry, citizenship, sex, marital or family status, disability, gender, or any other legally protected status when making our hiring decisions. If you have a disability or special need that requires accommodation, please let us know.