Market Surveillance Manager

AJ Bell plc; Manchester; Hybrid; GBP 60,000 - 80,000; Full time

Job summary

A leading UK investment platform company in Manchester is seeking a Market Surveillance Team Manager to oversee a specialist team. The role involves ensuring compliance with market abuse regulations, leading investigations, and engaging with stakeholders to enhance awareness. The ideal candidate will possess strong analytical skills, leadership experience, and a solid understanding of regulatory frameworks. This position offers a competitive salary, hybrid working model, and comprehensive benefits.

Benefits

Competitive starting salary

Holiday entitlement of 27 days

Pension schemes with matched contributions

Discretionary bonus scheme

Annual free share awards

Health Cash Plan

Discounted private healthcare

Free gym access

Sick pay+ pledge

Enhanced parental leave

Casual dress code

Qualifications

• Strong knowledge of FCA supervisory expectations.
• Proven experience in financial crime or market surveillance.
• Ability to lead and motivate a specialist team.

Responsibilities

• Lead a team ensuring compliance with regulatory obligations.
• Oversee investigations and provide quality assurance.
• Engage with internal stakeholders to improve market abuse awareness.

Skills

Market Abuse Regulation

Team leadership

Analytical skills

Stakeholder engagement

Tools

LiquidMetrix

ComplyAdvantage

Job description

As Market Surveillance Team Manager, you will lead a specialist team responsible for identifying, investigating, and escalating potential market abuse and suspicious trading activity. You will ensure the firm meets its regulatory obligations under MAR and FCA requirements, while continuously strengthening the effectiveness, efficiency, and maturity of the market surveillance function.

This is a hands‑on leadership role combining technical expertise, people management, and stakeholder engagement within a regulated investment environment.

What the job involves:

Leadership & People Management

• Lead, develop, and motivate a team of Market Surveillance Analysts, embedding high performance, accountability, and professional development.
• Own performance management, coaching, succession planning, and Training & Competence requirements.
• Manage workflow planning, alert volumes, and resourcing to ensure SLAs and regulatory deadlines are consistently met.

Market Surveillance & Investigations

• Oversee the timely and accurate review of surveillance alerts, ensuring appropriate escalation of potential market abuse in line with policy and the STOR regime.
• Provide quality assurance over investigations, ensuring clear rationale, robust documentation, and defensible decision‑making.
• Maintain and enhance surveillance system calibration to improve detection capability and reduce false positives.

Governance, Risk & Regulatory Compliance

• Ensure ongoing compliance with FCA expectations, including SYSC obligations and Market Abuse Regulation.
• Produce and review MI, trend analysis, and regulatory reporting for senior management, governance forums, and regulators.
• Maintain strong audit readiness through consistent application of policies, procedures, and controls.
• Identify and deliver process improvements and system enhancements to strengthen surveillance capability.
• Partner with Technology and Data teams on system upgrades, new functionality, and innovation, including AI‑driven alerting and communications surveillance.
• Contribute to risk assessments, thematic reviews, and horizon scanning to ensure emerging risks are identified and mitigated.

Stakeholder Engagement & Advisory

• Act as a trusted subject matter expert for internal stakeholders Compliance, Risk, Dealing, and senior management.
• Serve as a key point of contact for regulatory engagement relating to market surveillance activity.
• Deliver training and guidance to first‑line teams to improve awareness of market abuse risks and controls.

What skills and experience you need:

• Strong working knowledge of Market Abuse Regulation, STOR obligations, and FCA supervisory expectations.
• Proven experience in market surveillance or financial crime within an investment platform, broker, or similar regulated environment.
• Demonstrated people management experience, with the ability to lead, develop, and deliver through teams.
• Strong analytical capability with experience interpreting complex trading data and identifying suspicious patterns.
• Confident communicator, able to engage credibly with senior stakeholders and regulators.
• Experience with market surveillance systems and data analytics tools, such as LiquidMetrix, ComplyAdvantage, or similar platforms.

About Us

AJ Bell is one of the fastest‑growing investment platform businesses in the UK offering an award‑winning range of solutions that caters for everyone, from professional financial advisers to DIY investors with little to no experience. We have over 644,000 customers using our award‑winning platform propositions to manage assets totalling more than £103.3 billion. Our customers trust us with their investments, and by continuously striving to make investing easier, we aim to help even more people take control of their financial futures.

Having listed on the Main Market of the London Stock Exchange in December 2018, AJ Bell is now a FTSE 250 company.

Headquartered in Manchester with offices in central London and Bristol, we now have over 1,500 employees and have been named one of the UK's ‘Best 100 Companies to Work For’ for six consecutive years and in 2025 named a Great Place to Work®.

At AJ Bell you can expect a friendly working environment with a strong sense of teamwork, we have a great sense of pride in what we do, and this is reflected in our guiding principles.

What we offer:

• Competitive starting salary depending on experience
• Starting holiday entitlement of 27, increasing up to 31 days with length of service and a holiday buy and sell scheme
• A choice of pension schemes with matched contributions up to 8%
• Discretionary bonus scheme
• Annual free share awards scheme
• Buy As You Earn (BAYE) Scheme
• Health Cash Plan – provided by Simply Health
• Discounted private healthcare scheme and dental plan
• Free gym
• Employee Assistance Programme
• Sick pay+ pledge
• Enhanced maternity, paternity, and shared parental leave
• Loans for travel season tickets
• Charitable giving opportunities through salary sacrifice
• Calendar of social events, including monthly payday drinks, annual Christmas party, summer party and much more
• Personal development programmes built around you and your career goals, including access to personal skills workshops
• Monthly leadership breakfasts and lunches
• Casual dress code
• Access to a range of benefits from our sponsorship deals

At AJ Bell, our people are the heart of our culture. We believe in building strong connections by working together. That's why we offer a hybrid working model, where you'll spend 3‑4 days per week in the office. For new team members, the first 3 months will be spent full‑time in the office to help you immerse yourself in our business and build valuable relationships with your colleagues.

AJ Bell is committed to providing an environment of mutual respect where equal employment opportunities are available to all applicants and all employees are empowered to bring their whole self to work.

We do not discriminate on the basis of race, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, age, pregnancy, religion, physical and mental disability, marital status and any other characteristics protected by the Equality Act 2010. All decisions to hire are based on qualifications, merit and business need.

If you like the sound of the above, or just want to know more about the company and the role, we'd love to speak to you.