Associate

Associate — Fintech Regulatory & Commercial (3–5 Years)

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Davidson Firm PLLC · New York, NY (Midtown, four days in office)

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$160,000 – $210,000 base depending on regulatory depth, plus performance bonus and origination credit

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About the role

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Davidson Firm is a fintech boutique in Midtown Manhattan, ranked by Chambers in 2025 and 2026 for Fintech. We serve as outside and embedded counsel to payments companies, banking-as-a-service platforms, lenders, banks, and venture-backed fintechs, advising across the full range of issues that come with building and scaling a financial technology business — regulatory, commercial, corporate and M&A, IP, employment, and day-to-day general counsel matters. Our work often starts with the questions that determine whether and how a product ships: how the sponsor-bank relationship should be structured, who owns which compliance obligation, how regulators are likely to view it, and what the contracts need to say.

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We are hiring one mid-level associate. You would be the lawyer on the matter — not the fourth name on the memo.

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What you would actually work on

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•  Bank partnership and BaaS program structuring — sponsor bank agreements, program manager arrangements, and the allocation of BSA/AML and consumer compliance obligations between the parties.

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•  Payments and money transmission regulatory work — licensing analysis, product structuring, agent-of-payee questions, and the practical question of what a client can launch and when.

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•  Commercial contracting tied to fintech products — master services agreements, API license agreements, order forms, data agreements and vendor arrangements.

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•  Product counseling — sitting in the room with founders and product teams while the decision gets made, rather than receiving it afterward.

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•  Direct client contact from week one. We run lean, and clients know who is doing their work.

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Who we are looking for

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•  Three to five years of practice. Admitted in New York, or admitted elsewhere and eligible.

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•  Real exposure to at least one of: bank partnership or BaaS work, payments and money transmission regulation, consumer financial services, or fintech commercial contracting. Depth in one and genuine curiosity about the rest is enough — we would rather train breadth than teach instinct.

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•  Backgrounds that tend to fit: a fintech, payments or bank regulatory group at a larger firm; NYDFS, the CFPB, the OCC or a comparable regulator; or in-house at a fintech or sponsor bank.

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•  The instinct to make a call in a gray area and say what you would do. Our entire practice is gray areas. "It depends" is where the analysis starts, not where it ends.

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•  The ability to write to a founder in two sentences without losing the accuracy.

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What is different about working here

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Lawyering Like an Owner® is our trademark, and it is also the operating model:

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•  Origination credit from day one — revenue on business you bring in. If you are helping build the firm, you should share in it. Very few firms our size say this out loud, and fewer still say it to a mid-level associate.

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•  An 1,800-hour target. That is the actual number, not 2,100 with a wink.

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•  Direct partner access. You will work alongside the partners on the matter, not three layers below them.

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•  An AI-leveraged practice. We are serious about using AI in the actual workflow, not as a marketing line. Part of what you would learn here is how to operate as a modern, highly leveraged lawyer. If you would rather be more productive than merely more billable, this is the place for it.

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•  A real path. Counsel and partner are visible from here, and the firm is small enough that your work is visible too.

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Compensation and logistics

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•  $160,000 – $200,000 base, depending on regulatory depth and experience

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•  Performance bonus tied to hours and contribution

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•  Origination credit on revenue from business you bring in

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•  Health, dental and vision — the firm pays the bulk of the premium

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•  Flexible PTO; we target around three weeks and ask that people plan coverage thoughtfully

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•  Midtown Manhattan, four days a week in office

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We move quickly. We aim to go from first conversation to decision in under three weeks. Finalists complete a short exercise based on a real (scrubbed) matter, and we pay for your time on it.

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Davidson Firm PLLC is an equal opportunity employer.