Head of Financial Crime
2 days ago
Barcelona
Venga is a crypto platform for beginners who have not yet purchased their first bitcoin and are looking to take their first steps in blockchain/crypto. We are the first Catalan crypto app, and we are focused on building something that speaks to the local communities in Barcelona, Catalonia, and in the whole of Spain. We want to educate and empower people to effortlessly discover, and make their first investment in crypto. Venga has been approved by the Comisión Nacional del Mercado de Valores (CNMV) in Spain and holds the MiCA license to operate in Europe as a crypto asset service provider. We're looking for a Head of Financial Crime to take ownership of the day-to-day management and execution of Venga's financial crime operations across customer onboarding, transaction monitoring, fraud, investigations, law-enforcement requests, banking reporting, and customer offboarding. Reporting directly to the MLRO, you will manage the AML team, establish clear functional ownership across the department, and ensure that financial crime controls operate consistently, efficiently, and in line with Venga's policies, risk appetite, and regulatory obligations. You will also work closely with the CCO, who owns Venga's wider compliance framework, regulatory governance, risk appetite and compliance policies. A key part of your role will be translating policies and regulatory requirements into practical procedures, controls, workflows and measurable operational standards. This is a hands-on leadership role for someone who combines strong financial crime expertise with excellent people management, operational, and technical capabilities. The ideal candidate is structured, analytical, and comfortable directly managing a small team while building processes that can scale as Venga's customer base, transaction volumes, and product offerings grow. • Take full ownership of the day-to-day management and execution of Venga's financial crime operations., • Directly manage the AML analysts and establish clear responsibilities, ownership, and escalation paths across the team., • Ensure that each analyst has a clearly defined primary area of responsibility and understands when and how cases must be escalated., • Allocate work across the team based on risk, capacity, complexity and operational priorities., • Hold regular one-to-one meetings with each team member and maintain clear development plans that cover performance, skills, and career progression., • Define and manage operational KPIs for the AML team, with input from the MLRO and CCO, and ensure they do not prioritize speed or volume at the expense of investigation quality or financial crime risk management., • Identify individual training needs and create opportunities for analysts to develop into more senior or specialized roles., • Establish a culture of ownership, high-quality decision-making, constructive challenge and continuous improvement., • Monitor workloads, operational capacity, service levels, and backlogs across onboarding, monitoring, investigations, and other financial crime workflows, and take corrective action as required., • Design and maintain a clear Customer Support-to-AML escalation process to ensure that only genuine compliance, fraud, or financial crime matters reach the AML team., • Produce structured weekly and monthly management information for the MLRO., • Provide the CCO with appropriate visibility into operational performance, material risks, policy implementation and control weaknesses., • Support the CCO and MLRO in the review of new products, customer journeys, banking flows and operational changes., • Work closely with Product, Engineering, Customer Support, Finance, Legal and external providers to implement effective financial crime controls., • Participate in regular governance meetings involving the CCO and MLRO to review operational performance, emerging risks, policy changes and control effectiveness., • Oversee the effectiveness and consistency of B2C and B2B onboarding controls., • Ensure that KYC, KYB, customer risk classification, and enhanced due diligence procedures are applied correctly and consistently., • Oversee the operational execution of customer restrictions, exits and offboarding decisions., • Ensure offboarding actions are appropriately documented, controlled and completed within agreed timelines., • Support the development of Venga's B2B onboarding capability and ensure that the required KYB, ownership, control and risk-assessment processes are operationally scalable., • Oversee transaction monitoring and fraud operations across crypto-assets, fiat transactions and future products., • Ensure alerts and cases are allocated, reviewed, investigated and escalated within defined service levels., • Monitor the effectiveness of transaction-monitoring rules and fraud controls and provide the MLRO with evidence-based recommendations for improvement., • Identify emerging financial-crime typologies, control gaps, and operational blind spots, and recommend proportionate enhancements to the MLRO., • Produce the operational analysis and supporting data required for the MLRO to define, refine and approve monitoring thresholds, rules and scenarios., • Define business requirements for compliance dashboards, case-management workflows, alerts, reporting tools and process automation., • Establish quality-assurance processes covering alert reviews, investigations, escalations and case documentation., • Review samples of completed work to identify inconsistencies, control weaknesses, training needs and potential blind spots., • Ensure that complex or sensitive cases are escalated promptly to the MLRO., • Coordinate the operational preparation of SARs while recognizing that the final decision remains with the MLRO., • Ensure that investigation files provide a complete, consistent and auditable record of the analysis performed and the conclusions reached., • Coordinate the operational handling of requests from law-enforcement authorities and other authorized external bodies., • Prepare complete case files and supporting documentation for the MLRO's review and approval., • Oversee AML-related reporting and communications with banking and payment partners., • Coordinate responses to requests regarding transactions, customer activity, account restrictions, sources of funds, and financial crime controls., • Ensure that banking-partner communications are consistent, properly approved and supported by a clear audit trail., • Support the CCO and MLRO during audits, inspections, regulatory inquiries and other AML-related external reviews., • Take primary responsibility for drafting and maintaining financial crime SOPs, working closely with the CCO, MLRO and Legal., • Ensure that documented procedures accurately reflect how the team operates in practice., • Ensure SOP lifecycle management, version control, documentation standards, change logs and scheduled reviews., • Support the preparation of audit packs, evidence files, control documentation and remediation plans., • Ensure that changes to policies or risk appetite are implemented across systems, team workflows, training and quality controls., • You have significant professional experience in AML, financial crime, fraud, or compliance operations within the crypto and blockchain space, preferably in a regulated environment., • Core Knowledge: Deep understanding of blockchain and crypto., • You are technical and can understand monitoring systems, rules, thresholds, data, dashboards, and workflow automation., • Experience with blockchain analytics, crypto transaction monitoring, fiat transactions, and card fraud is a must., • Native or Advanced level of English., • Native or Advanced level of Spanish is a plus., • You have previously managed AML analysts or financial crime operations and are comfortable setting expectations, managing performance and developing team members., • You have strong practical knowledge of KYC, KYB, customer risk assessment, EDD, transaction monitoring, fraud, investigations, suspicious activity reporting and customer offboarding., • You are comfortable making operational decisions while escalating final statutory, regulatory and suspicious activity decisions to the MLRO., • You combine attention to detail with an ability to identify broader patterns, control weaknesses and emerging risks., • You are highly organized and able to manage multiple workstreams, operational priorities and escalations simultaneously., • You are comfortable working in a small, fast-moving team and are willing to remain hands-on where necessary., • You communicate clearly, challenge constructively, and work effectively with key stakeholders across Compliance, AML, Product, Engineering, Legal, and the wider business., • Full-time permanent employment contract., • "Venga, own-your-time!" company culture: manage your daily schedule around core hours., • Short Fridays with the end of work at 4 PM., • Hybrid work with mandatory office days: Mondays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays., • Rainy Days Policy: come to the office later and adjust your office schedule if there is heavy rain in Barcelona., • Remote Travel Policy: work remotely if you want to travel and work from a different location, as long as it's within a 3-hour time zone difference from Barcelona and not more than 1 week at a time., • Health insurance from Sanitas., • A sunny office in Barcelona, less than 50 meters from the beach., • A new MacBook., • Exciting work in a dynamic, international, and hyper-growth MiCA-regulatedstartup. #J-18808-Ljbffr
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