Head of Fnality Europe

Fnality is building the future of financial market infrastructure – creating regulated, blockchain-based payment systems to power tomorrow’s wholesale banking ecosystem. Backed by leading global banks and operating at the intersection of technology, finance, and regulation, we are powering the future of finance, together. There are no precedents for what we're doing. With you on our side, we'll be setting new ones every day.

Working at Fnality

Be your best:
We have a supportive culture that helps to bring the best out of each and every single one of our employees.

Feel free to explore:
Bring your new ideas and help us to solve problems together by joining a community of experts.

Be part of something bigger: We will support you by fostering an open, honest culture, that enables flexibility and wellbeing. Feel part of something bigger while being yourself.


Feel empowered:
We want you to feel empowered. The nature of our business can help make this a reality. We have the
agility, speed and innovation of a start-up, and a flexible working environment that enables this.

Role Purpose

Fnality are seeking a commercially minded and forward-thinking senior professional to lead our regulated Financial Market Infrastructure (FMI) operations in Germany. This role is accountable for ensuring the effective delivery, resilience, and operational performance of our European payment system, working within a robust regulatory environment overseen by the European Central Bank (ECB).

As a senior leader reporting to the Group CEO and participating in the Group Executive Committee, you will help shape local strategy, strengthen regulatory relationships, and ensure our services meet the highest standards of operational integrity and compliance. You will also lead business development activities with participants and support an agenda of visibility in the Eurozone marketplace. To achieve company objectives, you will work closely with group functions, regulators, financial institutions, and industry bodies to ensure our platform remains aligned to supervisory expectations and evolving market needs.

This role is well-suited to a capable leader with strong knowledge of payment systems, operational resilience, and regulatory frameworks who is ready to influence the future and drive the commerciality of a key infrastructure at the heart of the financial ecosystem.

Key Responsibilities:

· Proactively manage revenue, expenses, and the consistent growth of the business alongside the group leadership team.

· Overseeing all FN local operations (supported by group colleagues) and business activities to ensure they produce the desired results and are consistent with the overall group strategy and mission

· Drive efficiency, performance and continuous improvement through adoption of group initiatives and day-to-day management

· Managing resources within the local within the parameters of the Group Target Operating Model

· Act as the primary regulatory liaison for Fnality EU with regulators

· Ensure that Fnality EU passes the regulatory and Board ‘stage gates’ needed to grow the business in line with business plan objectives

· Compliance with all applicable ECB, Bundesbank and TARGET guidelines, directives and regulations as they apply to wholesale payment systems, including the CPMI-IOSCO Principles for Financial Market Infrastructure (PFMI).

· Reporting on Fnality EU internally (eg to the Board) and externally (e.g., to the regulators), building effective working relationships with them

· Ownership of all associated 1LOD Risks for Fnality EU

· Work closely with the Fnality Group Risk & Audit teams in the effective running of the 3 LOD governance model.

Required competencies:

· Strong relationship-building skills with regulators, financial institutions, and industry partners

· Comfortable leading responses during operational issues, supporting escalation processes, and coordinating cross-functional, global teams

· Solid knowledge of ECB, (CPMI-IOSCO PFMIs), and German regulatory expectations relevant to payment systems, capable of interpreting regulatory guidance and implementing practical changes within the business

· Good understanding of resilience frameworks, including continuity planning, testing, and incident recovery

· Awareness of modern cyber risks and controls expected for critical payment infrastructure

· Appreciation of the requirements and public-interest responsibilities tied to operating critical FMI

· Awareness of developments in payments, digital transformation, and standards such as ISO 20022

· Experience in improving processes, supporting service delivery, and maintaining high-quality operational performance

· Commitment to transparency, responsibility, and regulatory expectations.

· Collaboration & Cultural Awareness – Able to work effectively across diverse teams, group functions, and international stakeholders.

Required skills and experience

· Excellent Stakeholder relationship skills to support the ability to operate at C-suite, Board and external Shareholder/Participants.

· Experienced in managing and collaborating across global organisations ensuring alignment of EU and group

· Commercial acumen and gravitas to drive and contribute to related commercial and financial negotiations to grow group revenue targets

· Strong Leadership skills to drive multiple local resources and successful intra-company resource agreements

· Evidence knowledge of dispute resolution, either internally or externally, informally or formally

· Awareness and understanding about the financial concepts and procedures that relate to Fnality, particularly within the wholesale payments landscape, FMIs and the potential use of DLT to enhance the industry

· Is effective in facilitating meaningful collaboration, enabling and empowering stakeholders and teams to deliver against our strategic vision and outcomes

· Able to take a hands-on approach to staying informed, provide insight and guidance to internal teams across the Group as well as providing critical updates to regulators/customers and other external stakeholders.

Why should you join Fnality?

We employ curious individuals who thrive working in a fast-paced and constantly changing environment, who work best when empowered to drive their own work, and who are not afraid to fail fast and learn quicker.

You will be an analytical thinker who is able to look at tasks and understand the most efficient way to achieve the desired outcome. You will be vigilantly outcomes-focussed and have an insatiable desire to learn, adept at picking up new challenges and giving anything a go. You will want to deliver as much as learn and you will understand how important the power of the team is.

A bit more about us 

Digital transformation is changing our lives, work and businesses. While other sectors evolve, however, financial markets remain slow, fragmented and siloed. What the world needs now is a future-facing financial system for the digital age.

At Fnality, we have been speaking – and listening – to the real users of today’s financial systems. From businesses to banks, there is a clear, collective ambition for a simpler, faster, safer and more resilient payment system; one that can move and settle money quickly and efficiently, with minimized risk and much more transparency.

Fnality Global Payments

We are building a network of new payment systems that will enable tokenised, peer-to-peer markets.

Fnality Global Payments (FnGP) will comprise a series of national systems, each regulated in its home jurisdiction. We call each of these a Fnality Payment System (FnPS).

In each payment system, a Fnality settlement asset will act as the settlement/payment asset for any Payment (P), Delivery v, Payment (DvP) or payment vs. payment (PvP) need.

FnGP are underpinned by Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT). The nature of DLT is such that it enables FnGP to:

· Operate a true peer-to-peer market 

· Allow for immediate settlement 

· Interoperate across business platforms and jurisdictions

The key benefits of the above are: 

· Reduced counter-party and credit risk 

· Reduced operational risk 

· Efficient liquidity management 

· An ability to move resources from risk mitigation to business growth 

Eligibility

This role is a Germany-based role, and you must be eligible to work in the EU. Please note we cannot sponsor visas for this role.

Please note this is a hybrid role, where you will be expected to attend the office in Eschborn regularly.

How will we use the information about you?

We will use your personal information to process your application, to enable us to assess your suitability for a role and for other legitimate business purposes such as improving our sites and talent management practices. We may share your data with third parties to achieve these purposes. We will not use or share your information for marketing purposes.

We will take appropriate security measures to safeguard your information in accordance with data protection legislation. If you would like further information about how your information may be processed by us, please contact us at [email protected].