Legal Counsel-cmb

-Job description

**Legal Counsel, 0000JC4I**

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**About Legal**

Global Legal plays an important role in protecting HSBC’s reputation, helping to safeguard the organization by providing robust and comprehensive advice on legal issues and risks. Our lawyers advise senior management and the Global Businesses and Functions. They offer a range of legal skills, jurisdictional experience and practice specialisms across all the countries and territories in which HSBC operates.

**Role Overview**

The Legal Counsel provides expert and professional legal advice, guidance and support to ensure that the legal and reputational risks faced by the area of coverage are identified, reported and mitigated. This role will typically report to a Senior Legal Counsel, an Associate General Counsel or to a Country General Counsel.

Career progression may be into roles with greater accountability in a similar area of coverage, such as Senior Legal Counsel (GCB5 or GCB4).

**Principal responsibilities**
- To provide expert and professional legal advice, guidance and support to the HSBC’s commercial banking business (‘**CMB**’) in UAE and across MENAT in a cost-effective manner to ensure that the Group's exposure to legal and reputational risk is identified, reported and mitigated
- Be the accountable lawyer or aiding the accountable lawyer for HSBC’s CMB business in MENAT on all material legal issues that the business faces
- Drafting, reviewing and negotiating relevant transaction documentation principally focused on lending transactions but including all forms of CMB documentation used across onboarding, lending, trade and in respect of new product development
- Execute against relevant policies and procedures for the relevant area of coverage to ensure that Legal's role in the second line of defence can be executed
- Advising relevant CMB Management on non-standard legal and reputational risks
- Evaluating and responding to changes in legal and regulatory requirements as they arise
- Provide legal advice, that is prompt, succinct, easy to understand, and adds value by identifying the root cause of the problem and seeing the ‘bigger picture’
- Provide commercially sensitive, pragmatic and practical guidance and support to relevant businesses in relation to CMB in a cost-effective manner
- Ensure that legal implications and risks of initiatives and/or complex matters are effectively communicated to and understood by the relevant business area
- Working alongside Regional General Counsel, MENAT and Regional Head of CMB Legal, MENAT on broader wholesale and functional projects as required.
- Maintain and develop positive and professional working relationships with CMB and wider product teams (e.g. GPS and GTRF), other functional departments (e.g. compliance) and the wider CMB and Global Banking Legal teams across MENAT and globally
- Participate effectively as part of the CMB and MENAT Regional legal teams, sharing legal knowledge and best practice with colleagues.
- Assist in the management of legal risk in relation to the CMB business in accordance with group policy requirements, to include implementation and provision of advice to on legal and regulatory developments affecting the CMB business across the region
- Brief Legal management on major issues arising in relevant business areas and major legislative changes in area of expertise
- Proactively maintain knowledge of and adhere to HSBC Group operations and policies.
Requirements

**To be successful in the role, you should meet the following requirements**:

- Qualified Lawyer (0-5 years PQE) with experience of lending transactions (both bilateral and syndicated)
- Knowledge and experience of banking law concepts (in particular credit & lending, UAE corporate structures, security and trade finance concepts) and a working knowledge of the laws in the major jurisdictions in which HSBC operates across MENAT
- Familiarity with industry standard documentation (including LMA documentation).
- Corporate experience, restructuring experience and Compliance experience an advantage, but not essential
- Knowledge of the HSBC Group corporate structures, its business and personnel and a clear understanding of

HSBC’s corporate culture
- Ability to prioritise
- Communication and inter-personal skills
- Developing lateral thinking/problem solving skills
- Knowledge of Islamic finance and Arabic language skills will be an advantage but not essential.

Issued by The Hong Kong and Shanghai Banking Corporation Limited.