Director - Senior Counsel, Research, APAC

Job Description:

Your background

• Providing legal advice and support to Asia- Pacific (APAC) Research management and to APAC Research Compliance personnel, global control room personnel as well as supervisory analysts and Research Analysts.  Also provide incremental but regular legal support to Global  Research management, Compliance and supervisory analysts during APAC operating hours as part of global coverage model.
• UK or US or comparable legal qualifications.  Minimum 8 years of relevant experience
• Strong written and spoken English required, given need for review of reports published in English and daily interaction with personnel throughout region and globally.  Mandarin beneficial. 
• Capital Markets and/or investment banking legal experience strongly preferred.
• Exposure to Research Legal/Compliance issues a significant benefit.

What you can expect

As a member of small global legal team supporting one of the largest and most highly regarded investment research departments in the world, we support research analysts in over 20 countries producing research reports discussing economics, equities, ESG, digital assets, currencies, fixed income securities, thematic investing, commodities and many other topics.  Senior level interaction with Research management, and with regional regulators, as well as other third parties and other business units, including investment banking, sales and trading, audit and compliance.  Direct report to Associate General Counsel for Global Research in New York. 

What you will do

• Advise Research Management and Research Compliance on the effect of existing or proposed laws and rules affecting the publication and distribution of research reports or relating to conflicts of interest affecting research analysts
• Review research reports (including pre-deal research reports) referred by Global Control Room or supervisory analysts that contain discussions of companies included on the firm’s Watch or Restricted Lists, or describing pending litigation, regulatory matters or other significant strategic transactions.
• Participate with Research Management and other business and support partners in the development of strategic business initiatives and offer advice to mitigate legal risk in connection with those initiatives.
• Interact with internal business and control partners and industry groups, as well as representatives of regulators, in connection with the above.
• Coordinate with internal and external litigation and Compliance in connection with internal investigations or reviews/investigations undertaken by regulators or other legal matters.
• Advise Compliance on policies and procedures created or modified in response to new rules or litigation or regulatory settlements affecting the business of Global Research.
• Review contracts, RFPs, confidentiality agreements and other documents relevant to the research business.
• Participate in efforts to protect the Research Department’s intellectual property rights.
• Coordinate with global Research Counsel and other business and support partners outside APAC to ensure consistent global approach to research matters, to the extent required by policy.
• Participate in training of research analysts together with Compliance and Research Management, as required.

About Bank of America

Our purpose as a firm is to make financial lives better, through the power of every connection. Across the world, we partner with leading corporate and institutional investors through our offices in more than 35 countries. In the U.S. alone, we serve almost all of the Fortune 500 companies and approximately 67 million consumer and small-business clients. We provide a full suite of financial products and services, from banking and investments to asset and risk management. We cover a broad range of asset classes, making us a global leader in corporate and investment banking, sales and trading.

Connecting Asia Pacific to the world

Our Asia Pacific team is spread across 19 cities in 12 markets. We are focused on connecting Asia to the world and the world to Asia, using our global expertise to ensure success is shared between us, our clients and our communities. Our regional footprint covers 12 currencies, more than a dozen languages and five time zones, placing us firmly among the region’s leading financial services companies.