Senior Associate, Investment Operations - Global Asset Servicing

Ares is seeking a Senior Associate to join its Investment Operations team in our NYC office. This role will involve servicing loans within WSO and helping to oversee our reconciliations in relation to all servicing activities, including corporate actions, capital calls, restructures, loan servicing events, etc. The ideal candidate will process and oversee the daily activity for all asset types, coordinating with the fund admins, banks, and other stakeholders to ensure all processing is completed on a daily basis.

This position will require learning corporate actions and loan servicing, as well as managing activity within Wall Street Office. Previous experience with bank debt and working with a global client base is helpful, but not required—including pensions, insurance companies, and institutional investors.

Ares, as an alternative asset manager, has an asset mix which is comprehensive and heavily concentrated in bank debt. The ideal candidate would have experience working with diverse lines of business for a global client base including pensions, insurance, and institutional investors. The role requires a dynamic, adaptive, experienced hands-on professional to ensure best practices in a fast-paced rapidly growing environment.

Responsibilities

• Assist in reviewing daily position reconciliations to ensure accurate loan balances are being reflected in all systems.

• Proactively research, resolve and prevent all cash and par breaks with custodian banks and third-party administrators.

• Assist with the daily management and operation of the reconciliation process including cash, par and non-custody reconciliations with both custodian bank and paying agents across all funds.

• Direct fund administrators and custodian banks on appropriate processing and review/reconcile processing output for accuracy while looking for root cause issues.

• Review legacy standard operating procedures and update where necessary to reflect current-day steps and systems.

• Work with internal teams on vendor processes identified for more efficient processing in-house for Loan Operations.

• Prepare daily, weekly, monthly, and quarterly KPIs to track trends and workflow issues.

• Maintain high standard of quality controls.

• Influence and participate in decisions on policies/procedures designed to ensure compliance with internal, legal, and regulatory policies and ensure changing business requirements are met.

• Work with all internal and external stakeholders to improve and enhance Recon team workflows.

• Contribute ideas and recommendations to improve process efficiencies and increase risk mitigation.

• Participate in meetings representing the Loan Operations and Recon teams and participate in department initiatives such as system enhancements, off hours testing and new business conversions as necessary.

Qualifications:

• Bachelor’s degree in Finance or other business related discipline

• Minimum of 5-8 years of experience in high quality, global capital markets or investment management firms with expertise in Investment Operations and Asset Servicing related functions.

• Experience in Investment Operations in any of middle office or back-office functions is preferred.

• Prior experience with an alternative asset manager preferred broader asset management experience preferred.

• Ability to learn loan servicing process in Wall Street Office and Black Mountain (Allvue), Everest, Geneva, and/or IVP data management platforms.

• Understanding of basis accounting theories.

• Loan Operations and corporate actions experience in private/middle market loans ideal

• Ability to learn new concepts quickly

• Extract meaningful information from extensive research and analysis to effectively present facts and findings in a digestible format, a keen eye for attention to detail

• A self-directed individual with a can-do attitude, willing to work in an energetic, collaborative, and fast-paced environment, proactive in nature, and a proven ability to resolve issues with minimal supervision

• Outstanding communication (written and verbal), presentation, documentation, collaboration, and interpersonal skills

• A hands-on approach and ability to synthesize business operations and talent needs

• Ability to successfully manage multiple priorities and competing demands

• High accuracy and detail orientation

• Good judgment in terms of escalating issues vs. solving problems independently

• A solutions and automation oriented individual, self-starter and ability to see the big picture

• Comfort in dealing with ambiguity and uncertainty in a dynamic and fast-paced environment

• Ability to be flexible in terms of hours to coordinate with team members across various time zones

• An analytical mind and a passion/interest in bringing new ideas to increase efficiency of existing processes

• Dependable, great attitude, highly motivated and a team player