Trading Operations Lead - Mercury

Mercury is building a complete finance stack for startups, working to create the easiest and safest banking experience possible to simplify entrepreneurs’ and business owners’ financial lives. Underneath our products is a massive web of partners, requiring significant product and process investment handled by the Financial Partnership Operations team.

We’re looking for a Trading Operations Lead to own and scale the trading operations function powering Mercury’s SEC-registered investment advisor and FINRA-member broker-dealer. This is a hands-on leadership role for someone with deep brokerage and trading operations expertise who can set operational standards and step directly into complex workflows when needed.

In this role, you will:

• 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; oversee operational controls, reconciliations, exceptions, and escalations, partnering with Engineering, Product, and carrying brokers.
• Own the trade surveillance and operational control framework, including licensed supervisory review, pre- and post-trade controls, best execution monitoring, trade breaks, and coordination with Financial Crimes on surveillance alerts.
• Supervise order-flow reporting obligations, including CAT (all elements, including annual clock synchronization), CAIS, and TRACE; ensure compliance with SEC Rules 606 and 607 and FINRA Rule 6151.
• Serve as the operational escalation point for trade errors, breaks, and settlement issues, coordinating investigation and resolution across Engineering, Product, Compliance, and executing partners.
• Oversee trading-related books and records requirements, partnering with Engineering, Compliance, and our carrying broker to ensure required records are appropriately generated, retained, and retrievable.
• Maintain trading operations procedures, contributing to applicable Written Supervisory Procedures to ensure controls and supervisory practices remain aligned with systems and partner relationships.
• Lead trading operations readiness for regulatory exams, audits, and internal testing, including producing operational evidence and remediating findings.
• Manage day-to-day operational relationships with our carrying broker, executing brokers, custodians, fund companies, and transfer agents.
• Partner closely with Product and Engineering on system-managed trading workflows and controls, bringing operational and supervisory perspectives to requirements and product launches.
• Build reporting and operational visibility to oversee the trading function, tracking volumes, breaks and errors, aging exceptions, and settlement performance.
• Collaborate across Compliance, Finance, Legal, Risk, Product, and Engineering on new products, partners, and regulatory changes.

You should have:

• Active FINRA Series 7, Series 63, and Series 24 licenses (Series 99 or Series 57 is a plus).
• 8+ years in trading, brokerage, or investment operations, including direct ownership of trade lifecycle, settlement, or trading control functions.
• Hands-on operational experience across fixed income, mutual funds, and ETFs.
• Experience building or materially improving a trade surveillance or operational control framework.
• Strong working knowledge of operational requirements under FINRA and SEC rules (recordkeeping, supervision, best execution, trade reporting, and customer protection).
• Clear written communication skills adaptable for regulators, engineers, and executives.
• Comfort operating in ambiguity and at speed with strong judgment regarding automation and manual controls.

Nice to have:

• 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.