Hedge Accounting Operations Specialist

Overview:

We don’t simply hire employees. We invest in them. When you work at Chatham, we empower you — offering professional development opportunities to help you grow in your career, no matter if you've been here for five months or 15 years. Chatham has worked hard to create a distinct work environment that values people, teamwork, integrity, and client service. You will have immediate opportunities to partner with talented subject matter experts, work on complex projects, and contribute to the value Chatham delivers every day. 

For many corporations, obtaining and applying preferential hedge accounting treatment is a requirement for entering into any financial derivative transactions. That is why the Corporates Hedge Accounting Team is instrumental to the success of the Corporates sector at Chatham. Our team is focused on ensuring that our clients understand the accounting guidance for derivatives and that they have the support to maintain hedge accounting treatment through entirety of the transaction lifecycle.

The Corporates Hedge Accounting Team is made up of a team of accounting and finance professionals that deliver accounting solutions to our existing client base. Our clients span size and complexity from public Fortune 50 multinational corporations that hedge interest rate, commodity, and FX risks, to the smaller private companies that hedge one asset class. This team is responsible for delivering accounting solutions such as advisory projects and support, system and program implementation, financial reporting, effectiveness testing, and ad hoc analysis.

In this role you will:

The primary focus of this position is to support Chatham’s hedge accounting consultants in numerous capacities including preparing and reviewing client analyses, managing the processes related to generating and reviewing period-end accounting deliverables for clients, and assisting with the testing of proprietary hedge accounting technology. The position will be based in either our Kennett Square headquarters or our Denver office, and the person in this role will work with consultants across both office locations.  Primary responsibilities include:

• Provide support to hedge accounting consultants – The Corporates Hedge Accounting team advises over 150 companies in financial risk management. As our clients contemplate various economic strategies, our team prepares analyses to demonstrate the financial reporting impacts of potential accounting applications. As clients enter into derivative transactions, trade-specific deliverables are prepared, which typically include memos, system configuration, and quantitative testing. The person in this role will assist in the completion of transaction-related services—by either preparing or reviewing the deliverables—with oversight from the hedge accounting consultants.
• Facilitate the generation of periodic accounting deliverables for clients– The Corporates Hedge Accounting team provides derivative fair values, journal entries, effectiveness tests, and other deliverables to over 150 companies during month and quarter-ends. The client-base is expected to grow through the new services and technology, as well as the onboarding of new clients.  Reporting deliverables have very tight deadlines tied to our clients’ close processes and require a significant coordination to prepare and review.  Much of this process has been automated by Chatham’s technology team but review, oversight, and coordination are always necessary to deliver the highest quality product to our clients.
• Software testing – Chatham develops a large amount of its hedge accounting technology in-house.  This process relies on a high degree of communication and collaboration between developers and the subject matter experts within the hedge accounting team. Software is released at the end of each two-week sprint cycle, which must be tested prior to release to ensure new functionality is operating as intend and/or new enhancements do not interfere or break existing functionality.  The person in this role will develop intimate knowledge of the hedge accounting technology and will be responsible for testing new and existing functionality and providing valuable input and feedback to developers as part of the software development cycle.

In addition to the core responsibilities of this role, a successful hire will sponsor and encourage change that enhances our processes and technology, enabling us to grow and scale our dynamic and complex business. Accordingly, this role will not be a static operations role and will provide a myriad of growth opportunities.

Your impact:

This is an important role within the team, and individuals who perform excellently will be highly valued team members. Career development opportunities involve taking on more complex client portfolios and asset classes, managing cross-team processes, and sponsoring initiatives within the organization. Areas of impact include:

• Enabling hedge accounting consultants to accomplish more by providing support during month-end and quarter-end financial reporting, daily transaction implementation and documentation, and ad hoc analysis and project work
• Liaising with internal teams such as our technology and data integrity teams to ensure client deliverables are timely and accurate
• Partnering and collaborating on client questions and requests to enable consultants to focus outwardly

Contributors to your success:

The ideal candidate has a willingness to learn complex areas of accounting and risk management and is a process-oriented thinker with strong attention to detail. This position is tailored for a professional interested in challenging, client-serving work within a dynamic team environment, who prefers not to have the pressure of being directly client-facing.

• Minimum of 2 years of accounting, audit, and/or operations experience
• SQL or VBA experience is preferred but not required
• Strong values and work ethics
• Strong preference to find efficiencies and implement process improvements
• Highly motivated and independent worker
• Willingness to learn complex economic and accounting strategies
• Enjoys working in a dynamic team environment
• Proactive and forward-thinking
• Ability to prioritize/manage time, meet deadlines and problem solve
• Thoroughness and attention to detail
• Demonstrates initiative

About Chatham Financial:

Chatham Financial delivers financial risk management advisory and technology solutions to organizations across industries and around the world by helping companies maximize value in the capital markets. At Chatham, we help businesses improve their bottom lines. But that’s not the only place we’re committed to making an impact. We look beyond our clients, too — enhancing the markets where we work, supporting the clients we partner with, helping our employees thrive, and giving back to the world at large. And when you join Chatham, you’re an integral part of this equation, enabling us to live this purpose-driven philosophy every day.