Chief Compliance Officer, Post-Trade Services

Chief Compliance Officer (CCO) holds a key position responsible for designing, implementing, and maintaining a robust compliance program to ensure that CDS Clearing and Depository Services Inc. (CDS) and the Canadian Derivatives Clearing Corporation (CDCC) each operate within their applicable legal and regulatory frameworks.  This mandate covers the complete end-to-end compliance framework for both entities.

The CCO ensures an integrated compliance strategy by coordinating with the Businesses, Risk Management, Internal Audit and Enterprise Compliance functions, as well as with the TMX General Counsel’s Office. Providing assurance on the effectiveness of post-trade compliance, the CCO reports directly to the Board of Directors and the Vice President, Regulatory Affairs and Enterprise Compliance.

Given that CDS and CDCC are recognized clearing agencies and designated systemically important Financial Market Infrastructures (FMIs), the CCO is tasked with ensuring strict adherence to applicable legal and regulatory requirements, including those stemming from such federal designation and provincial recognitions.  In this role, the CCO also liaises directly with key regulators.

Key Accountabilities

1. Compliance Strategy & Oversight

• Ensure the continued development of a strong, credible, robust culture of compliance through leading the function with excellence, practicality, and strong relationships with the businesses, risk management, legal, TMX affiliates, and external stakeholders

• Assess the overall compliance framework for CDS and CDCC and adapt it to the evolution of the post-trade businesses and their regulatory requirements, accounting for the systemically important nature of these businesses and their similarities and differences; and on an ongoing basis, reassess the compliance framework to ensure it continues to be fit for purpose

• Serve as a strategic advisor on the compliance impact of changes to post-trade businesses, including changes to rules, risk frameworks and IT infrastructure

• Maintain and oversee written policies, procedures and controls to ensure compliance with applicable federal and provincial laws, regulations (including National Instruments), Recognition Orders, and Oversight Agreements and international obligations (collectively the Regulatory Requirements), and monitor regulatory and industry trends affecting the FMIs

• Ensure timely and appropriate review of written policies and procedures is undertaken regarding the operation of the clearing agencies, develop and conduct training and monitoring to ensure policies and procedures are understood and complied with

• Collaborate with the Chief Risk Officer (CRO) to ensure that compliance risks are identified, assessed, and mitigated within each FMI's overall enterprise risk management framework

• Lead the management and delivery of annual disclosures against international standards designed to ensure the safety, efficiency, and resilience of clearing, payment, and settlement systems (i.e., the Principles for Financial Market Infrastructures (PFMI)), including ensuring that appropriate senior clearing agency staff are identified to "own" each key consideration of an applicable PFMI principle, that each owner understands and applies the required PFMI assessment methodology, and periodically assessing the PFMI compliance program including by benchmarking against global peers 

• Meet, as appropriate, with staff at the Canadian Securities Administrators (CSA) and the Bank of Canada (BoC) to discuss compliance matters, coordinate with the General Counsel’s Office and other stakeholders to respond to questions from relevant regulators and maintain relationships with such regulators

• Act as a trusted advisor on compliance matters to CDS and CDCC, including responding to early warning questions, establishing trust and open communication with the businesses to allow for proactive detection and remediation; and advise business lines on compliance regarding Participants’ and Clearing Members’ adherence to rules, procedures and manuals

• Coordinate responses to due diligence questionnaires from Participants covering a variety of areas, including AML, KYC, politically exposed persons, cyber security

2. Governance & Board Reporting

• Prepare and certify an Annual Compliance Report assessing the overall health of the compliance programs, including the FMIs’ compliance with regulatory requirements for submission to the Board and regulators

• Engage with the relevant Boards as needed regarding, apprising the Board of material non-compliance that poses a risk to market participants or the broader financial system

• Meet in camera with the Board and/or designated committees, as needed, and at least once annually to discuss the state of the compliance program

3. Incident/Crisis Management

• Monitor and report any breaches of regulatory requirements to applicable stakeholders on a timely basis

• Respond promptly and assist as needed in incident management or crisis scenarios, coordinating with risk management, legal, business, operations, technology and other internal stakeholders in the execution of post-trade controls, surveillance, incident management and reporting

• Collaborate with business lines to periodically update recovery and wind-down plans, which ensure systemic stability by detailing how FMIs manage severe stress, allocates uncovered losses, or safely winds down operations, and participate in default management and recovery plan simulations

Must Have(s)

• Experience: Minimum 10 years of compliance experience within a regulated entity, including at least 3 years in a primary compliance leadership role

• Regulatory Engagement/Oversight: Proven experience liaising directly with capital markets, banking, or other regulators (e.g., Bank of Canada, CSA, OSFI), and developing and executing compliance frameworks in a complex regulatory environment

• Industry Knowledge: Deep expertise in compliance requirements for regulated entities, such as financial market infrastructures or financial institutions

• Leadership & Collaboration: Track record of driving strong compliance culture, and collaborating effectively across legal, enterprise risk, operations, business and finance functions

• Communication: Exceptional written and verbal communication skills, with the proven ability to communicate effectively to all levels in an organization, including C-suite executives and Boards of Directors

Nice to Have(s)

• Domain Expertise: Specialized experience and strong operational familiarity with Canadian securities, derivatives, clearing, and settlement systems 

• Language Skills: Professional proficiency in French is an asset

The recruiting efforts for this role are intended to fill a vacant position.