We are seeking a motivated and innovative AI Researcher, Asset Management to support our fundamentally driven investment teams. In this pivotal role, you will collaborate directly with front office analysts and portfolio managers to deliver advanced AI solutions, drive research and development, and enhance investment decision-making through state-of-the-art data science and machine learning techniques. You will leverage your industry experience, AI expertise, financial machine learning knowledge, data engineering skills, and software development expertise to build robust tools, standards, and infrastructure that enable our teams to stay ahead in a rapidly evolving market.

Position Responsibilities: 

• Collaboration & Support: Work closely with investment professionals to identify AI/ML project opportunities, develop prototypes, and implement key capabilities tailored to fundamental investment processes.
• Tooling & Software Development: Design, build, and maintain Python SDKs, libraries, and applications for investment insights, portfolio construction, and risk management.
• Research & Innovation: Lead or contribute to cutting-edge research projects, including adversarial machine learning, synthetic data generation, and deep generative modeling for financial applications.
• Standards & Architecture: Define and implement best practices for MLOps, CI/CD, and data governance, ensuring robust and scalable AI infrastructure.
• Industry Insights: Stay current with advancements in LLMs, GenAI, time series simulation, and integrate emerging technologies into investment workflows.
• Communication: Effectively explain complex concepts to various stakeholders and support the adoption of new AI tools and processes.

Required Qualifications:

• Education: PhD or Masters equivalent in Financial Engineering, Machine Learning, Statistics, Mathematics, Computer Science or related field.
• Experience: 5+ years in financial markets (buy-side preferred), with direct exposure to processes supporting fixed income trading and investment.
• Technical Skills:
  • Fixed income trading, valuation, with demonstrated buy side or sell side research experience
  • Advanced Python programming and open-source software development (e.g., DeltaPy, AtsPy, DataGene, MTSS-GAN).
  • Experience with cloud platforms (Azure preferred), ML development environments (Databricks), and containerization (Docker, Kubernetes).
  • Familiarity with CI/CD tools (Jenkins, CircleCI), experiment tracking (MLFlow), and full ML lifecycle management.
  • Expertise in LLM, time series forecasting, synthetic data generation, and model risk management.
  • Experience working with investment data, including understanding of security characteristics, propagation up and down the hierarchy, and the impact of corporation actions.
  • Experience in deploying and maintaining RAG pipelines and working with vector databases like MongodB/ LancedB.
  • Experience developing within an agentic framework, using Langgraph, Semantic Kernel, MCP etc.
  • Understanding of the research process showcased by at least one publication or major project.
  • Cloud and Containerization: Familiarity with cloud platforms (preferably Azure), ML development environments (Databricks), and containerization technologies (Docker, Kubernetes).
  • Experiment Tracking and Monitoring: Exposure to experiment tracking tools (e.g., MLFlow) and monitoring solutions.

Preferred Qualifications:

Collaboration: Strong communication skills and experience working with cross-functional teams in investment management.

Bonus Points:

• Hands-on experience with Databricks Unity Catalog and full-stack engineering for proof-of-concept demos.
• Demonstrated ability to rapidly learn and apply new frameworks and libraries.
• Contributions to published work in top journals, open-source contributions with significant adoption.

Motivations & Values

• You are passionate about advancing asset management through AI and quantitative analysis.
• You thrive in collaborative, high-performance environments and take ownership of impactful solutions.
• You are committed to integrity, innovation, and continuous learning.

When you join our team:

• We’ll empower you to learn and grow the career you want. 
• We’ll recognize and support you in a flexible environment where well-being and inclusion are more than just words. 
• As part of our global team, we’ll support you in shaping the future you want to see. 

#LI-Hybrid

About Manulife and John Hancock

Manulife Financial Corporation is a leading international financial services provider, helping people make their decisions easier and lives better. To learn more about us, visit https://www.manulife.com/en/about/our-story.html.

Manulife is an Equal Opportunity Employer

At Manulife/John Hancock, we embrace our diversity. We strive to attract, develop and retain a workforce that is as diverse as the customers we serve and to foster an inclusive work environment that embraces the strength of cultures and individuals. We are committed to fair recruitment, retention, advancement and compensation, and we administer all of our practices and programs without discrimination on the basis of race, ancestry, place of origin, colour, ethnic origin, citizenship, religion or religious beliefs, creed, sex (including pregnancy and pregnancy-related conditions), sexual orientation, genetic characteristics, veteran status, gender identity, gender expression, age, marital status, family status, disability, or any other ground protected by applicable law.

It is our priority to remove barriers to provide equal access to employment. A Human Resources representative will work with applicants who request a reasonable accommodation during the application process. All information shared during the accommodation request process will be stored and used in a manner that is consistent with applicable laws and Manulife/John Hancock policies. To request a reasonable accommodation in the application process, contact [email protected].

Referenced Salary Location

Salary range is expected to be between

If you are applying for this role outside of the primary location, please contact [email protected] for the salary range for your location. The actual salary will vary depending on local market conditions, geography and relevant job-related factors such as knowledge, skills, qualifications, experience, and education/training. Employees also have the opportunity to participate in incentive programs and earn incentive compensation tied to business and individual performance.

Manulife/John Hancock offers eligible employees a wide array of customizable benefits, including health, dental, mental health, vision, short- and long-term disability, life and AD&D insurance coverage, adoption/surrogacy and wellness benefits, and employee/family assistance plans. We also offer eligible employees various retirement savings plans (including pension/401(k) savings plans and a global share ownership plan with employer matching contributions) and financial education and counseling resources. Our generous paid time off program in the U.S. includes up to 11 paid holidays, 3 personal days, 150 hours of vacation, and 40 hours of sick time (or more where required by law) each year, and we offer the full range of statutory leaves of absence.

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