Remote Lead Data Scientist: Financial Analytics & AI

Placements24; Rustenburg; Hybrid; ZAR 900,000 - 1,800,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Health benefits

Remote stipend

Unlimited PTO

Professional development

Job summary

Placements24 is seeking a Lead Data Scientist to drive advanced analytics in financial services. This remote-first role leads a team, defines the analytics roadmap, and delivers ML and statistical modeling to unlock insights from complex datasets.

You will mentor data professionals, partner with engineering and product teams, and communicate findings to stakeholders. A PhD or master's and 7+ years in data science with finance focus are required.

Qualifications

• PhD or Master’s degree in Data Science or related quantitative field.
• 7+ years hands-on data science experience with a strong financial services focus.
• Proven track record leading data science teams and projects from conception to deployment.
• Expertise in Python or R and libraries such as Pandas and NumPy.
• Deep understanding of ML algorithms (supervised, unsupervised, deep learning), statistical modeling, and experimental design.
• Experience with big data technologies (Spark, Hadoop) and cloud platforms (AWS, Azure, GCP).
• Strong SQL skills for data extraction and manipulation.
• Excellent communication and remote-friendly collaboration skills.

Responsibilities

• Lead the design, development, and deployment of ML models for financial applications.
• Identify new data sources and analytical opportunities to drive business value.
• Mentor and manage a team of data scientists and analysts, fostering high performance.
• Develop and maintain the data science strategy and roadmap.
• Communicate complex findings clearly to stakeholders across the organization.
• Oversee data preprocessing, feature engineering, and model validation.
• Collaborate with engineering and product teams to deploy solutions.
• Stay at the forefront of data science and AI advances.

Skills

Leadership

Team management

Python

SQL

Communication

Statistical modeling

Education

PhD or Master’s degree in data science or related quantitative field

Advanced degree in statistics/math/computer science

Tools

Spark

Hadoop

AWS

Azure

GCP

Pandas

NumPy

Job description

Placements24 is seeking a Lead Data Scientist to drive advanced analytics in financial services. This remote-first role leads a team, defines the analytics roadmap, and delivers ML and statistical modeling to unlock insights from complex datasets.

You will mentor data professionals, partner with engineering and product teams, and communicate findings to stakeholders. A PhD or master's and 7+ years in data science with finance focus are required.