Sanctions & Compliance Analyst

Role Overview

This position is embedded in the financial crime compliance team and focuses on the daily review of sanctions screening hits generated by onboarding flows, payment processing, and customer/partner databases. You will determine which alerts are genuine matches, escalate credible risks, and maintain a clear audit trail for every decision. The role matters because it helps the firm operate within international sanctions frameworks while enabling legitimate business to move forward without unnecessary friction.

Key Responsibilities

• Work through sanctions screening alert queues from customer, payment, and partner channels, deciding whether each hit is a true match or a false positive and recording the reasoning behind each outcome.
• Run checks against global sanctions lists, watchlists, politically exposed persons (PEP) registers, and adverse media sources, escalating confirmed or likely matches through the prescribed internal workflow.
• Carry out deeper investigations into customers, transactions, and counterparties, reviewing account activity, ownership structures, and supporting documents to gauge potential sanctions, AML, CFT, and reputational exposure.
• Keep sanctions list data and internal blacklists current, ensuring screening systems are synchronized with the latest designations issued by regulators and global bodies.
• Document investigations thoroughly in the case management system, write clear case summaries and escalation memos, and close alerts within agreed service level agreements.
• Support the compliance framework by tracking regulatory changes, contributing to policy updates, and advising business units and agile squads on sanctions-related questions and targeted financial sanctions notices.
• Assist in testing and tuning sanctions screening systems, reviewing match rules and parameters, and highlighting control gaps or process weaknesses for remediation.
• Promote a strong compliance culture through training, sharing lessons learned from cases, and supporting quality assurance activities and audits with well-prepared records.

Requirements & Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in law, finance, business, or a closely related discipline.
• Professional certification such as CAMS, CGSS, ICA Certificate/Diploma in AML or Financial Crime Compliance, or CFE.
• At least two years of practical experience in financial crime compliance, AML, or sanctions compliance within a regulated financial institution.
• Working knowledge of major sanctions regimes including OFAC, UN, EU, UK HMT, and local regulations, with the ability to interpret and apply them in daily screening and investigation work.
• Hands-on experience with sanctions screening and name-matching tools, including participation in model validation, tuning, or screening optimization initiatives.
• Strong analytical and written communication skills, with the ability to produce clear, defensible documentation for internal and external review.