Senior Specialist, Fund Accounting

About Northern Trust:

Northern Trust, a Fortune 500 company, is a globally recognized, award-winning financial institution that has been in continuous operation since 1889.

Northern Trust is proud to provide innovative financial services and guidance to the world’s most successful individuals, families, and institutions by remaining true to our enduring principles of service, expertise, and integrity. With more than 130 years of financial experience and over 22,000 partners, we serve the world’s most sophisticated clients using leading technology and exceptional service.

Specialist Fund Accounting is a key position and requires high subject matter expertise and advanced technical skills. This role would support internal teams and external clients by ensuring operational excellence, adherence to regulatory standards and will serve as a point of escalation of complex issues.

The role will bridge the gap between US ETF business intelligence, ETF systems development, project management and day-to-day execution. Understand the intricacies of various functional fund accounting and ETF areas will be critical to facilitate effective cross-functional and cross-business unit collaboration and enable efficient and informed decision-making.

Major Duties:

• Perform or oversee daily NAV production for registered mutual funds, ensuring accuracy and timeliness.
• Review and validate key components of the NAV including securities pricing, corporate actions, income accruals, expenses, and foreign exchange.
• Serve as a subject matter expert (SME) for complex fund accounting topics, including fair value pricing, swing pricing, derivatives, and complex fund structures.
• Ensure daily accounting deliverables meet SLAs and internal/external quality standards.
• Collaborate closely with internal teams (reconciliations, pricing, corporate actions, client service) and external parties (investment managers, auditors, vendors) to resolve exceptions.
• Participate in the onboarding of new funds and implementation of accounting system changes or client-specific requirements.
• Maintain and enhance process documentation and internal controls in compliance.
• Provide support during audits, regulatory exams, and financial statement preparation.
• Identify and support opportunities for automation, efficiency, and risk mitigation in daily processes.
• Act as a technical mentor and knowledge resource for junior team members without direct supervisory responsibility.
• Additionally, ETF Operations Specialist’ to support the continued growth of the ETF platform as we continue to build out a fully comprehensive ETF business that can compete with the largest asset managers in the market.
• Assist the ETF Operations team with investigating fund specific issues, breaches and other queries.
• Drive efficiencies and process improvements within the team and oversee management reporting and efficiency metrics.
• Work closely with Product development and Technology to ensure successful development and implementation of new products and product enhancements.      

Knowledge/Skills:

• A sound understanding of financial markets with knowledge of Passive/ETF/Index related products               
• Good knowledge around regulatory and governance requirements such as SEC requirements (e.g. Prospectuses and other offering documents) and US fund regulation.                            
• Exceptional communication and relationship management skills, with an ability to think strategically, manage complexity, significant change and multiple key priorities
• Excellent time management, presentation skills and communication to multiple levels (clients, other 3rd parties, executives, peers, subordinates)
• Experience in project management as a plus             
• Highly motivated, self-sufficient, with a can-do attitude and a strong willingness to learn, take on new challenges and serve our clients.          
• Diligent, efficient and able to manage multiple conflicting deliverables including working under pressure while maintaining a high level of attention to detail              

Experience Required:

• Degree educated in a related Finance discipline or with relevant professional work experience    

Working with Us:

As a Northern Trust partner, greater achievements await. You will be part of a flexible and collaborative work culture in an organization where financial strength and stability is an asset that emboldens us to explore new ideas.

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