Senior Counsel, Regulatory (Asia Pacific)

About the role

Mastercard is seeking a Senior Counsel to provide strategic, practical and commercially focused regulatory support across Asia Pacific for its Commercial & New Payment Flows business, covering Corporate Solutions, Small-Medium Enterprises and Transfer Solutions, as well as cross-business initiatives. The role advises on existing and emerging regulations to open regulatory pathways, solve complex problems and realise business opportunities while managing regulatory risk.

Key responsibilities

• Serve as a key regulatory adviser for CNPF in Asia Pacific, primarily for Corporate Solutions and SME, with additional support for Transfer Solutions.
• Translate complex requirements into clear advice stating conclusions, assumptions, risks, options and recommended paths.
• Identify regulatory pathways supporting responsible innovation and growth, challenging assumptions and working through operational, financial, treasury, safeguarding and compliance dependencies.
• Advise on card-network and payment-system regulation, commercial and SME products, virtual cards, interchange and pricing, consumer protection, payment services and domestic and cross-border funds movement, including remittances and collections.
• Advise on digital-asset and stablecoin initiatives, including product and settlement use cases, licensing and registration, safeguarding and financial-crime controls.
• Partner with Financial Crimes, Compliance and other control functions on AML/CFT, sanctions, KYC and transaction monitoring.
• Assess licensing, authorization, registration and notification requirements; support market-entry and legal-entity strategies, applications, supervisory matters, examinations and remediation.
• Monitor Asia Pacific regulatory developments and coordinate submissions, consultation responses and advocacy positions, engaging constructively with regulators and managing outside counsel.
• Own a broad portfolio with a high degree of autonomy, prioritising effectively and delivering against compressed timelines in a global matrix.

Required profile

• Law degree and qualification to practice in at least one relevant jurisdiction, with significant experience in payments, financial services, fintech, technology or regulatory law.
• Broad, current payments-regulatory experience across card networks, payment systems, interchange and pricing, consumer protection and cross-border funds movement.
• Experience with cross-border transfers, commercial card and corporate payment solutions, virtual cards, B2B payments and SME products strongly preferred.
• Experience advising on digital assets or stablecoins, and with Australian and/or New Zealand payments regulation, strongly preferred.
• Firm understanding of AML/CFT obligations and ability to work with Financial Crimes and Compliance specialists.
• Strong judgment, ability to deliver concise business-friendly advice under pressure, and proven ability to manage a complex portfolio autonomously.
• Excellent written and oral English; additional Asia Pacific languages are an advantage.