Financial Examiners
Enforce or ensure compliance with laws and regulations governing financial and securities institutions and financial and real estate transactions. May examine, verify, or authenticate records.
Also known as: AML Director (Anti-Money Laundering Director), Anti Money Laundering Investigator (AML Investigator), Bank Compliance Officer, Bank Examiner, Bank Secrecy Act Anti-Money Laundering Officer (BSA/AML Officer), BSA Analyst (Business Systems Analyst), BSA Officer (Bank Secrecy Act Officer), BSA Specialist (Bank Secrecy Act Specialist), ...
Annual Salary
Median annual wage (May 2024)
Job Outlook
Projected growth, 2024–2034 (Much faster than average)
What You'd Do
- Investigate activities of institutions to enforce laws and regulations and to ensure legality of transactions and operations or financial solvency.
- Review and analyze new, proposed, or revised laws, regulations, policies, and procedures to interpret their meaning and determine their impact.
- Plan, supervise, and review work of assigned subordinates.
- Recommend actions to ensure compliance with laws and regulations, or to protect solvency of institutions.
- Examine the minutes of meetings of directors, stockholders, and committees to investigate the specific authority extended at various levels of management.
- Prepare reports, exhibits, and other supporting schedules that detail an institution's safety and soundness, compliance with laws and regulations, and recommended solutions to questionable financial conditions.
- Review balance sheets, operating income and expense accounts, and loan documentation to confirm institution assets and liabilities.
- Review audit reports of internal and external auditors to monitor adequacy of scope of reports or to discover specific weaknesses in internal routines.
- Train other examiners in the financial examination process.
- Establish guidelines for procedures and policies that comply with new and revised regulations and direct their implementation.
- Direct and participate in formal and informal meetings with bank directors, trustees, senior management, counsels, outside accountants, and consultants to gather information and discuss findings.
- Verify and inspect cash reserves, assigned collateral, and bank-owned securities to check internal control procedures.
- Review applications for mergers, acquisitions, establishment of new institutions, acceptance in Federal Reserve System, or registration of securities sales to determine their public interest value and conformance to regulations, and recommend acceptance or rejection.
- Resolve problems concerning the overall financial integrity of banking institutions including loan investment portfolios, capital, earnings, and specific or large troubled accounts.
- Evaluate data processing applications for institutions under examination to develop recommendations for coordinating existing systems with examination procedures.
- Provide regulatory compliance training to employees.
- Confer with officials of real estate, securities, or financial institution industries to exchange views and discuss issues or pending cases.
Top Skills
Importance scale: 1 (low) – 5 (high)
Knowledge Areas
Importance scale: 1 (low) – 5 (high)
Education Level Distribution
Percentage of workers in this occupation by education level
Technology & Tools
Software and tools commonly used in this role
In-Demand Technologies
Other Tools
Work Styles
Personality traits and work styles important for this career
Key Abilities
Cognitive, physical, and sensory abilities important for this role
Importance scale: 1 (low) – 5 (high)
Work Activities
General types of job behaviors occurring on this job
Importance scale: 1 (low) – 5 (high)
Work Environment
Physical and social factors that influence the nature of work
Related Careers
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Salary data: BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2024. Outlook data: BLS Employment Projections, 2024–2034.
This page includes information from the O*NET 30.2 Database by the U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration (USDOL/ETA). Used under the CC BY 4.0 license.