Operations Analyst

Operations Analyst – Financial Markets

Goodman Masson is partnering with a new financial markets venture under formation in Oman. Backed by prominent institutional investors, the business is building its operations from the ground up and is now hiring during the build phase.

This is a rare opportunity to join a business at the start of its journey, helping establish the operational processes and controls that will support its activities across financial markets.

The business will operate on a 21/6 basis, Sunday through Friday, supporting multiple asset classes and currencies across different markets and time zones. Operations will be delivered through a rotating shift pattern to maintain coverage throughout the operating window, making flexibility and genuine comfort with shift-based working essential.

The Role

We are looking for an Operations Analyst with hands-on securities operations or settlement experience to join the Operations team, supporting the day-to-day running of the business and ensuring settlement and related operational activities are completed accurately, on time and in line with established controls.

You will monitor settlement instructions and processing cycles, investigate exceptions, coordinate with settlement banks and custodians, and support participants with operational enquiries. Depending on your experience and training, you will also gain exposure to corporate actions, repo and collateral management, registry maintenance and participant account services.

We are particularly interested in candidates who have worked in multi-currency, multi-asset environments with real settlement deadlines, ideally within a regulated financial services operation. Previous experience working extended or non-standard hours would be a strong advantage.

Working closely with the Operations Lead, Operations Control and Product Technology, you will play an important role in maintaining operational accuracy, resolving issues and ensuring effective shift handovers and audit trails.

What You'll Do

• Monitor settlement instructions, processing dashboards and matching queues across approved products and currencies during your assigned shift.
• Monitor automated settlement cycles and batch processing, investigating failures and confirming cash and securities movements with settlement banks and custodians where required.
• Identify, record and investigate settlement exceptions, tracking outstanding items through to resolution.
• Monitor settlement failures and escalate persistent or unresolved issues within prescribed timeframes.
• Complete start-of-day and end-of-day operational activities, including readiness checks, monitoring processing outcomes and documenting outstanding items.
• Maintain accurate exception logs, incident records and supporting evidence, ensuring every open issue has a clear status, owner and next action.
• Provide comprehensive shift handovers covering outstanding exceptions, incidents, pending activities and escalations.
• Support corporate actions processing, including event notifications, participant elections, response deadlines and verification of entitlement distributions.
• Assist with repo and collateral management, including settlement of opening and closing legs, margin call monitoring, manufactured payments and collateral record maintenance.
• Support participant account opening, amendment and closure, maintaining static data and account records in accordance with approved controls.
• Produce holding statements and update instrument and participant registers following authorised events or amendments.
• Respond to participant enquiries, support instruction submission queries and coordinate with Product Technology to resolve connectivity and messaging issues.
• Record operational errors and near-misses, support incident triage and provide evidence for incident reviews, control testing and audits.
• Contribute to user acceptance testing, operational readiness exercises, business continuity testing and continuous improvement initiatives.
• Work flexibly within a rotating shift pattern covering the Sunday-to-Friday operating window, maintaining accurate processing and effective handovers across shifts.

Requirements

What You'll Bring

• A bachelor's degree in Finance, Business, Economics or a related discipline.
• At least three years' experience in securities operations, settlement, custody or financial markets operations.
• Practical, hands-on experience monitoring securities settlement and managing operational exceptions.
• Experience working in a multi-currency, multi-asset environment with time-critical settlement deadlines.
• Genuine willingness to work a rotating shift pattern covering extended operating hours, Sunday through Friday.
• Previous experience in an operation running extended or non-standard hours would be highly advantageous.
• A sound understanding of delivery-versus-payment (DvP) settlement, cash and securities reconciliation, settlement exceptions and operational controls.
• Experience working to operational cut-offs, shift rosters and handover procedures.
• Ability to use operational dashboards, processing queues and systems to monitor activity and investigate issues.
• Strong attention to detail, with disciplined record keeping and an understanding of the importance of maintaining a clear audit trail.
• Effective communication skills, including the ability to respond to participant enquiries and coordinate with internal and external stakeholders.
• Good judgement when identifying issues, prioritising work and escalating matters beyond delegated authority.
• The ability to remain composed and accurate during periods of high activity and time-critical processing.
• Fluency in written and spoken English.

Desirable Experience

The following would be particularly valuable:

• Experience working within a central securities depository (CSD), international CSD, custody bank or other financial markets organisation.
• Experience in a regulated financial services environment, with an understanding of the operational discipline required to maintain accurate, controlled and auditable processing.
• Previous experience working rotating shifts or supporting operations across different markets and time zones.
• Exposure to multiple asset classes and settlement across different currencies.
• Experience with corporate actions, including income events, redemptions and elective events.
• Experience with repo settlement, manufactured payments or GMRA documentation.
• Familiarity with multi-currency settlement processes and market and banking calendars.
• Knowledge of sukuk and Shari'a-compliant repo structures, including murabaha.
• Experience with SWIFT MT5xx settlement messaging and/or ISO 20022 messages, including sese for settlement and seev for securities events.
• Arabic language skills, in addition to English.

Benefits

Location and Terms

Based in Muscat, Oman. Permanent for Omani nationals; two-year fixed-term contract for expatriate hires. Omani nationals are strongly encouraged to apply.

If you have hands-on securities operations experience, thrive in a time-critical environment and are comfortable working shifts, this is an opportunity to help build the operational foundations of a new financial markets venture. Please apply now!