Member of Specialist Staff (Legal & Reg) @ Zuba
Legal
Posted on Jun 11, 2026
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Member of Specialist Staff (Legal & Reg) @ Zuba
🇬🇧 London (Bond Street) — 100% in-person
💰 Competitive (incl. equity)
About Zuba
About the role
We're looking for a Member of Specialist Staff (Legal & Reg) to own Zuba's legal and regulatory function as we scale across new payment corridors. This is our first dedicated hire covering both commercial legal and compliance, and we're designing the role for the way this work actually gets done now.
Large parts of traditional legal and compliance execution are being transformed by AI. Tools like Claude can produce first-pass MSAs, review onboarding files and draft regulatory memos faster than any associate or analyst. We don't need someone to do that work manually at scale. We need someone who can build the systems that make it happen and who has the judgment to know when the output is right.
Half your job is commercial: drafting, negotiating and closing the contracts that let us move money through new corridors. The expectation is speed. When we identify a new market opportunity, legal should be able to open that corridor in a week, not a quarter. The other half is regulatory: licensing strategy, KYB operations, sanctions and blockchain screening, transaction monitoring and the controls that keep us compliant across Canadian, US, EU and African jurisdictions.
What you’ll own
Three workstreams sit at the centre of this role:
Licensing: applications and maintenance, multi-jurisdiction. Standing up and keeping live our authorisations as we grow: MSB registration and RPAA registration in Canada, CASP and payment-institution (PSD2) authorisation in the EU, and FinCEN registration plus selective state money-transmitter licensing in the US. You own the applications themselves, the regulator correspondence, and the ongoing maintenance and reporting obligations that follow approval.
Market launch. Turning a new corridor from idea into live transaction: securing licensing and regulatory clearance with both authorities and banking partners, and papering the commercial relationships (MSAs, partner and payment-infrastructure agreements) that make the corridor operational. Launch is where legal, compliance and commercial converge, and you run all three.
Compliance systems and controls. Designing the policies and building the operational machinery: KYB onboarding, sanctions and PEP screening, transaction monitoring, and blockchain / on-chain screening for crypto flows. You then implement and tune the tooling that runs it. Your systems become the playbook.
Why this might excite you
Legal and regulatory from a single seat. You own both, so you see how commercial terms create regulatory exposure and how licensing constraints shape deal structure
Speed as a design principle. Templatised agreements, automated generation, AI-assisted review. When the business finds a new corridor, your job is to open it in a day
Build the infrastructure from scratch. Contract templates, onboarding frameworks, screening and monitoring routines and escalation processes. Your systems become the playbook
Multi-jurisdictional from day one. Canadian MSB / RPAA, US FinCEN (and possible state MTLs), European CASP / PSD2, and a growing number of African regulatory regimes
Direct regulator, bank and counsel interaction. You'll be in the room, not briefing someone who is
Who you are
You build things. When faced with a repetitive legal or compliance task, you build a template, write a script or create a workflow instead of doing it manually the tenth time
You're fast. You can turn around a clean MSA in hours, not weeks. You know the difference between risks that need negotiating hard and risks you accept with a carve-out and move on
You're analytically sharp. You read regulations and commercial terms and see the operational implications immediately
You're commercially aware. Legal and compliance exist to enable the business, not block it
You're a clear communicator. Contracts, memos, regulator responses and partner assessments are clean and don't need heavy editing
You have relevant experience. 1-4 years PQE, likely from a Magic Circle or US law firm. Less is fine if you're exceptional. We’re especially interested in backgrounds like M&A, commercial contracts, financial regulatory, and payments, but are open to candidates from other disciplines. Technical experience (scripting, building tools, working with LLMs) is also a strong plus
Some topics you’ll think about
How do we get from "new corridor identified" to "first transaction live" in a week?
What's the smartest licensing sequencing as we expand: which licences should we acquire, and where should we rely on partners?
Where should we automate legal and compliance execution with AI, and where does human judgment remain essential?
What we offer
💸 Competitive salary + meaningful equity
🏢 Central London office (potential NY relocation)
🌍 Global exposure & impact
🚀 High ownership + rapid growth
🍹 Team off-sites & regular socials
Our hiring process
We keep it fast and transparent.
Intro chat (30 mins). An informal discussion about your experience, values and what you're looking for
Technical case exercise. A cross-border expansion scenario covering legal, compliance, licensing and systems-design considerations
Work trial (one to two days). Live tasks at our Central London office: negotiating a partner agreement, building an automation, reviewing an onboarding file, drafting a regulatory memo
Offer. If all goes well, we'll extend an offer and can't wait to welcome you aboard