Head of Risk

Airwallex; Greater London; Hybrid; GBP 180,000 - 280,000; Full time

Job summary

Airwallex, a global fintech, is seeking a Head of Risk to lead its second line risk management across worldwide operations in the UK and beyond. You will build robust risk frameworks, governance, and monitoring, partnering with Product, Engineering, Compliance, and Commercial teams to enable growth while controlling risk.

This senior role reports to the Chief Regulatory and Compliance Officer and requires international leadership experience.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Finance, Accounting, Risk Management, Law, or related field.
• 15+ years of risk management, compliance, control, or audit experience in fintech or financial services.
• Experience building governance models and risk frameworks across multiple jurisdictions.
• Ability to define risk appetite, metrics, escalation, and governance processes.
• Strong communication skills and executive-level influence.

Responsibilities

• Lead and scale Airwallex’s global second line risk management function.
• Build frameworks, governance, monitoring and risk culture across the organization.
• Collaborate with Risk Product, Operations, Engineering, Commercial, and Compliance teams.
• Communicate risk appetite clearly across the company.
• Partner with leaders to minimize financial crime and other enterprise risks.
• Embed the Risk Management Framework across global entities.
• Advise executive leadership on regulatory requirements and risk strategy.
• Recruit, develop, and lead a high-performing global risk team.

Skills

Risk management

Compliance

Governance

Cross-functional collaboration

Leadership

Regulatory liaison

Education

Bachelor’s degree in Finance, Accounting, Risk Management, Law, or a related field

Job description

About Airwallex

Airwallex is the only unified payments and financial platform for global businesses. Powered by our unique combination of proprietary infrastructure and software, we empower over 250,000 businesses worldwide - including Brex, Navan, Qantas, SHEIN and many more - with fully integrated solutions to manage everything from business accounts, payments, spend management and treasury, to embedded finance at a global scale.

Proudly founded in Melbourne, we have a team of over 2,300 of the brightest and most innovative people in tech across 27 offices around the globe. Valued at US$11 billion and backed by world-leading investors including T. Rowe Price, Visa, Mastercard, Robinhood Ventures, Sequoia, Salesforce Ventures, DST Global, and Lone Pine Capital, Airwallex is leading the charge in building the global payments and financial platform of the future. If you’re ready to do the most ambitious work of your career, join us.

Attributes We Value

We hire successful builders with founder-like energy who want real impact, accelerated learning, and true ownership. You bring strong role-related expertise and sharp thinking, and you’re motivated by our mission and operating principles. You move fast with good judgment, dig deep with curiosity, and make decisions from first principles, balancing speed and rigor.

You're humble and collaborative; turn zero-to-one ideas into real products, and you "get stuff done" end-to-end. You use AI to work smarter and solve problems faster. Here, you’ll tackle complex, high-visibility problems with exceptional teammates and grow your career as we build the future of global banking. If that sounds like you, let’s build what’s next.

About the team

The Global Risk team at Airwallex plays a critical role in enabling the company’s growth by building a strong, scalable, and globally consistent approach to risk management. The team works across the business to define risk appetite, develop frameworks and policies, support strategic decision-making, and provide oversight of key risks as Airwallex expands across products, markets, and regulatory environments. You’ll be part of a highly collaborative group that partners closely with Product, Engineering, Operations, Commercial, Financial Crime Compliance, Regulatory Compliance, and Legal teams to help Airwallex grow responsibly and with confidence. This is a team where you’ll tackle complex, high-impact challenges, shape how risk is managed at a global fintech, and help build the foundations for long-term scale.

What you'll do

As Head of Risk, you will lead and scale Airwallex’s global second line risk management function across our worldwide operations. This is a senior leadership role for someone who can turn risk management into a business enabler by building robust frameworks, clear governance, effective monitoring, and a strong risk culture across a fast-growing fintech.

You will work closely with the Chief Regulatory and Compliance Officer and senior executives across the company to shape Airwallex’s risk strategy, strengthen enterprise oversight, and ensure our products, markets, and entities operate within approved risk appetite and tolerance levels.

This role is based in UK/Netherlands.

Responsibilities:

• Develop and lead Airwallex’s global risk management function and framework, spanning risk monitoring, detection, policy development, governance, escalation, and assurance activities across the Group’s worldwide operations.
• Create and execute risk strategies, guidelines, performance metrics, and monitoring mechanisms that identify and mitigate vulnerabilities across Airwallex’s existing and future products, while keeping risk management aligned to business priorities and approved risk appetite.
• Partner closely with Risk Product, Risk Operations, Engineering, Product, Data Science, Commercial, Operations, Compliance, and other stakeholders to manage risk at the product, portfolio, market, merchant, and entity levels.
• Communicate Airwallex’s risk appetite clearly and effectively across the company, helping teams make sound decisions and strengthening consistent adoption of risk standards and accountability.
• Collaborate with business, operations, technology, and product leaders to deliver measurable business outcomes while minimising exposure to financial crime, fraud, counterparty, liability, and broader enterprise risks.
• Monitor, enhance, and embed the Risk Management Framework so that all global entities operate within acceptable risk tolerance levels and in line with Airwallex’s governance expectations.
• Work closely with the Chief Regulatory and Compliance Officer, the CEO, and other senior executives on risk, control, governance, and strategic decision-making topics, including escalation of material issues where appropriate.
• Advise management on external risk, governance, and regulatory requirements across the markets in which Airwallex operates, and help ensure the company’s risk posture evolves with its global footprint.
• Champion a strong and practical risk culture across Airwallex by reinforcing that risk excellence is a competitive advantage and a shared responsibility across the company.
• Recruit, develop, and lead a high performing global team of risk professionals, and help build a scalable second line organisation that can support Airwallex’s next phase of growth.

Who you are

We're looking for people who meet the minimum requirements for this role. The preferred qualifications are great to have, but are not mandatory.

Minimum qualifications:

• Bachelor’s degree in Finance, Accounting, Risk Management, Law, or a related field.
• 15+ years of relevant experience in Risk Management, Compliance, Control, or Audit within fintech, payments, remittance, banking, or broader financial services.
• Strong experience building or leading risk management frameworks, governance models, and oversight programmes in a complex, multi jurisdiction environment.
• Demonstrated ability to define and operationalise risk appetite, policies, metrics, and escalation processes that support business growth while maintaining effective control standards.
• Experience working closely with senior management and cross functional teams, with excellent verbal and written communication skills and the ability to influence at executive level.
• Experience leading international teams and operating effectively in a fast-paced environment with high standards, evolving priorities, and significant cross functional collaboration.

Preferred qualifications:

• Experience in fintech and financial services, especially in payments, consumer finance, remittance, or other global money movement businesses.
• A combination of advisory and hands on risk management experience within a financial institution or similarly regulated environment.
• Experience partnering with regulators, auditors, boards, or executive risk committees on enterprise risk, governance, and control matters.
• Comfort working across a broad risk landscape, including enterprise risk, fraud, counterparty risk, operational risk, and regulatory risk.
• An independent, high ownership mindset, with the judgment and pragmatism to balance control effectiveness, innovation, and growth in a scaling global business.

Equal opportunity

Airwallex is proud to be an equal opportunity employer. We value diversity and anyone seeking employment at Airwallex is considered based on merit, qualifications, competence and talent. We don’t regard color, religion, race, national origin, sexual orientation, ancestry, citizenship, sex, marital or family status, disability, gender, or any other legally protected status when making our hiring decisions. If you have a disability or special need that requires accommodation, please let us know.