Operations Associate

Position: Operations Associate - Financial Services Location: Chicago, IL (must live in the Chicago area or relocate before start) Schedule: On site, five days a week at our River North office Type: Full-Time, direct EdgeClear employee with benefits Experience: 2 to 3 years in a role where accuracy was the job (operations, accounting, billing, data analysis, fund or brokerage operations, payments, or revenue operations) Target start: December 2026 About EdgeClear: EdgeClear is a Chicago futures brokerage that is pending approval to become a non-clearing Futures Commission Merchant (FCM). We are a small team building the operation from the ground up, so the person in this seat helps shape how it runs and will eventually own the clearing operations function. We are seeking a detail-driven Operations Associate to join EdgeClear as we launch our FCM. This position reports to our Executive Director and is designed to grow into Senior Operations Associate and then Clearing Operations Manager. This is a direct, stable career position at EdgeClear, built around training you into a leadership role in clearing operations in the booming financial markets industry. The Role: You will make sure every trade, position and dollar agrees across our back office system, our clearing firms and our execution platforms, every trading day. When something does not match, you find out why and take steps to balance it. Before launch, you will learn back office system and our clearing process in depth through user acceptance testing and end-to-end rehearsals, then take ownership of daily reconciliation and the back office after go-live. We do not expect you to know futures clearing yet. We will teach you. What we need from day one is the discipline you already use to keep a system of record clean and the habit of chasing every break until it closes. Key Responsibilities: Daily Reconciliation and Breaks: Reconcile back office system against each clearing firm's daily statements and against execution platform records, at customer account level Log every break, research the cause and work it to resolution with the clearing firm, the Trade Desk or Risk team Keep a clear break log and escalate anything open past its deadline Back Office System of Record: Set up and maintain customer accounts, commission schedules and fee schedules, the way you would administer a CRM Keep account data clean and consistent with account opening records and the clearing firms' records Record deposits and withdrawals as processed (you do not send or approve money movements) Check daily and monthly customer statements before they go out Fees, Invoices and Support: Check clearing, exchange and NFA fees and vendor invoices against contracted rates Track contract expirations and first notice dates with the Trade Desk Pull records for Finance, Compliance, auditors and the NFA when asked Before Launch: Learn QBO and take part in user acceptance testing with the vendor Help write procedures, checklists and break handling runbooks Take part in end-to-end rehearsals before go-live Required Skills & Qualifications: Experience: 2 to 3 years in a role where getting details exactly right was the job. Reconciliation: Hands-on daily or weekly reconciliation of data between two or more systems, with examples of breaks you found and closed. Systems: Experience administering a system of record such as Salesforce, HubSpot, Zoho, NetSuite or a similar back end, including setting up records, maintaining fields and rules, imports and exports, and keeping data clean. Excel and Data Analysis: Lookups, pivot tables, variance analysis and building your own reconciliation checks. Communication: Clear, concise writing. You can explain a break and its fix in a few lines. Education: Bachelor's degree in finance, accounting, economics or a related field, or equivalent experience. Licensing: Willingness to sit the Series 3 exam within your first year (sponsored by EdgeClear). Completing the circle: You do not leave a break open. You close it, document it and make sure it does not happen again. Coachable: A growth attitude and an open mind to coaching and feedback. Other Preferred Skills: Back office clearing systems: Hands-on experience with QBO, GMI or ION back office. Brokerage experience: Work at a broker-dealer, FCM or other financial brokerage, or FINRA licenses. Series 3: Already passed. Trading and/or investing experience is welcome. Growth Path: Progression is based on milestones, not time served: Run the daily three-way reconciliation on your own, with breaks resolved before the next trading day Become the firm's go-to user of the back-office system for account setup, fee schedules and daily processing Handle broken and error trades with the clearing firms with limited supervision Write and maintain the clearing operations procedures and train a backup Additional Details: Structured training in futures markets, clearing operations, regulation and back-office systems A small, dynamic team launching a new FCM A defined career path to Clearing Operations Manager, with pay reviewed at each milestone Offices in River North, Chicago Why Join EdgeClear? Impact: Help build the back office of a new FCM from the ground up. Career Growth: A defined, milestone-based path to Clearing Operations Manager. Stability: A direct, full-time role with a growing Chicago brokerage. Team Environment: Work closely with Trade Desk, Risk, Compliance and Finance. Benefits: Health insurance, 401(k) plan, education and Series 3 sponsorship. Compensation: Base salary of $62,000 to $72,000, plus discretionary annual bonus, health insurance, and a 401(k) plan. How to Apply: Include a short note (150 words or less) in the Summary portion of your application about one reconciliation you owned: what did not match, how you found it, and how you fixed it. This could be a billing issues, accounting or any other discipline where reconciliations are required. References: We will be checking at least 2 references during the due diligence process. NOTE: PLEASE ADJUST YOUR RESUME FOR THE REQUIRED SKILLS LISTED ABOVE AND DEMONSTRATE THAT YOU MEET THEM. APPLICATIONS ARE REVIEWED CLOSELY FOR DEMONSTRATED FIT. Equal opportunity employer.