Role Title: Lawyer/ Senior Lawyer, Europe & America

Role location: London     

About Westpac: We are Australia’s first bank and oldest company, and one of four major banking organisations in Australia. This opportunity sits in our London office working for Westpac Institutional Bank (WIB), the division of Westpac, which services the needs of our corporate, institutional, and governmental clients.

About the Team: The Europe & America (E&A) Legal team is a collegiate corporate legal team providing high quality advice to support the international aspirations of WIB, a Division of Westpac Group.  Through partnership with key internal and external stakeholders, this role will support the Westpac Group’s international legal and risk strategy by influencing, negotiating and consulting.  Our legal advice is accurate, timely, cost effective and commercial.

How will I help?

You will provide legal advice and support to WIB’s Financial Markets (FM) line of business (LOB), which provides finance solutions for Westpac’s institutional and corporate clients operating outside of Australia, predominantly in the UK, Europe and Americas.

Your primary focus will be structuring and negotiating financial markets trading documentation as well as supporting new product proposals and strategic initiatives, including the build-out of Westpac’s international repo offering across E&A.  You will also advise on UK and EU regulatory issues that impact financial markets products and documentation.  The demands of the business (and E&A Legal’s response to that demand) may require you to also support other WIB business areas and branch needs from time to time.

Key Accountabilities 

• Provide high-quality legal advice and support for FM’s E&A business in connection with structured financing transactions including hedging and derivatives products, loan-linked hedging, deal-contingent trades and related documentation such as ISDA master agreements; repos and related documentation such as GMRAs; and other ad-hoc documentation queries, including trading platform/venue access agreements, service agreements, broker agreements and delegated reporting agreements. 
• Assist with the development of template documentation across a variety of financial market product types and asset classes, including FX, rates and commodities, as well as advise on legal questions arising in respect of bespoke transactions. 
• Participate in new product proposals and strategic initiatives, provide subject matter expertise and interpretations of relevant laws, rules, regulations and industry practices, and advise business management on legal matters impacting the business.
• Proactively identify, evaluate and contribute to the appropriate management of legal, regulatory and reputational risk by collaborating with second line compliance and the first line business controls team, follow relevant legal developments, participate in internal projects and escalate as appropriate.
• Ensure external legal resources are properly and efficiently selected and used, and ensure output produced by external counsel complies with our policies and requirements.
• Clearly communicate and appropriately escalate issues to the Head of Legal, E&A.
• Build and maintain stakeholder relationships with relevant business stakeholders in WIB International and Legal & Secretariat (L&S) colleagues (in particular, work closely with other colleagues across E&A Legal in London and New York and WIB Legal in Sydney) to ensure efficient and effective execution of legal support.
• Contribute to the strategic and operational performance of L&S by contributing new ideas and initiatives, developing “house views”, function-wide improvements

What’s in it for me?  

You’ll be joining a highly supportive and collaborative team with international coverage during a period of Group Executive backed growth plans for WIB. You’ll be working in a collaborative and supportive team and work with senior stakeholders across our international offices. 

Westpac offers a comprehensive range of benefits including a range of health, wellbeing, lifestyle, and financial benefits.  

What do I need?

Knowledge, Experience & Capabilities

• Admitted as a solicitor in England & Wales and/or Australia, 3 - 7 years PQE.
• Top tier private practice or in-house legal experience supporting financial markets businesses. 
• A broad skill-set that is adaptable to supporting a range of financial markets trading and structured finance transactions.
• Effective stakeholder engagement skills. 
• Excellent judgement and problem-solving skills and ability to work autonomously.
• Collaborative and proactive team player with a growth mindset.

Desirable

• Experience with DCM transaction documentation. 
• Experience with German markets and trading documentation, including Deutscher Rahmenvertrag. 
• Commodities experience.

What’s it like to work here?  

When you join, you’ll become part of the broader Westpac family – where we aim to be a friendly, switched-on team working for a single purpose - Creating Better Futures Together – it’s what we do, who we are and why we come to work every day. As an equal opportunity employer, we’re proud to have created a culture where people can be their best, in an environment that values diversity and flexibility.

Within Westpac, you will be part of the Institutional Banking division, where our vision is to be a high performing and innovative institutional bank, committed to enabling the growth of our global clients, our economy, and delivering sustainable shareholder returns.

How do I Apply? 

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