Trading Operations Lead

Job Description

Trading Operations Lead | Mercury

The Tone:
This is a full-time, remote leadership role at Mercury. Mercury is building a complete finance stack for startups, aiming to provide the easiest and safest banking experience for entrepreneurs. This position within the Financial Partnership Operations team is crucial for maintaining external relationships and streamlining workflows, specifically by owning and scaling the trading operations function for Mercury’s investment advisor and broker-dealer. The role requires hands-on expertise to set operational standards and manage complex tasks in a regulated environment.

The TL;DR
• Role: Full Time
• Location: Remote
• Pay: $121500–$168700 USD yearly
• Team: Financial Partnership Operations team
• Mission: Own and scale the trading operations function powering Mercury’s SEC-registered investment advisor and FINRA-member broker-dealer.

What You’ll Actually Do
• Framework Ownership: Own the trading operations and supervisory framework, providing licensed principal oversight of order and trade activity across money market funds, mutual funds, ETFs, and fixed income.
• Control Oversight: Oversee the trade surveillance and operational control framework, including licensed supervisory review, best execution monitoring, trade breaks and errors, and escalation.
• Reporting Management: Own supervision of trading and order-flow reporting obligations, including CAT, CAIS, and TRACE, ensuring timely and accurate compliance with SEC and FINRA rules.
• Operational Escalation: Serve as the operational escalation point for trade errors, breaks, and settlement issues, coordinating investigation and resolution across internal and external partners.
• Partner & System Integration: Manage operational relationships with carrying brokers and other investment partners, and collaborate with Product and Engineering on system-managed trading workflows and controls.

The Must-Haves
• Background: Active FINRA Series 7, Series 63, and Series 24 licenses, coupled with deep leadership expertise in brokerage and trading operations within a detail-rich, regulated environment.
• Experience: At least 8 years in trading, brokerage, or investment operations, with direct ownership of trade lifecycle, settlement, or trading control functions, including hands-on experience across fixed income, mutual funds, and ETFs, and a proven track record of building or materially improving a trade surveillance or operational control framework.
• Skills: Strong working knowledge of FINRA and SEC operational requirements including recordkeeping, supervision, best execution, and trade reporting; ability to apply regulatory knowledge to novel workflows and communicate clearly in writing across technical and non-technical audiences; comfort operating in ambiguity and at speed, with a willingness to design new processes; sound judgment in deciding when to automate, add controls, or accept manual steps, with the ability to defend those decisions.
• Bonus: Experience at a fintech or high-growth firm operating a broker-dealer or RIA at scale; experience standing up a new product, partner, or clearing relationships from scratch; comfort with SQL or working directly in internal tooling to investigate issues yourself.