Principal, Pricing & Valuation-Control - Investment Operations

Over the last 20 years, Ares’ success has been driven by our people and our culture. Today, our team is guided by our core values – Collaborative, Responsible, Entrepreneurial, Self-Aware, Trustworthy – and our purpose to be a catalyst for shared prosperity and a better future. Through our recruitment, career development and employee-focused programming, we are committed to fostering a welcoming and inclusive work environment where high-performance talent of diverse backgrounds, experiences, and perspectives can build careers within this exciting and growing industry.

SUMMARY Ares is seeking a strategic, hands-on Principal of Pricing to lead our enterprise pricing and valuation-control capability. Reporting to the Head of Operations, this individual will set the vision and operating model for pricing, build scalable tooling and rules, strengthen SOX and valuation governance. The role will combine control ownership, product leadership, and vendor management to ensure the pricing function scales with the complexity and growth of the investment platform. The successful candidate will operate at the intersection of Operations and other strategic data partners, including Portfolio Management, Technology, Fund Accounting, Compliance, and both internal and external audit teams. The individual should be equally comfortable setting enterprise direction and engaging in detailed challenges, while bringing an external perspective on the evolving pricing and valuation models in the market. This is an opportunity for a builder and enterprise leader who can take a complex pricing environment and make it more systematic, transparent, automated, commercially efficient and easier to govern. Reporting Relationship Reports to: Head of Operations Key partnerships: Private Valuation leadership, investment teams across Credit, Private Equity, Special Situations, Technology, Finance, Audit and strategic market-data / pricing vendors PRIMARY FUNCTIONS & ESSENTIAL RESPONSIBILITIES: Core Pricing Operations & Data Stewardship Own the daily pricing process across loans, bonds, equities, derivatives and private securities. Source data from vendor and internal team uploads and review discrepancies, significant variances, stale pricing, and pricing history to ensure accurate records. Own the strategic and commercial relationship with third-party market pricing vendors. Monitor service quality, coverage, methodology, controls, resiliency, and implement new capabilities. Partner with portfolio managers and investment teams to deliver timely and accurate investment information and support valuation conclusions in accordance with applicable accounting and audit standards. Continuous improvement on design and maintenance of pricing rules hierarchy by asset class and source - including vendor selection, source precedence, tolerance thresholds, stale-price logic, fallback rules and escalation criteria. Lead implementation and rollout of new pricing functionality, system enhancements, integrations, and vendor solutions; drive decisions, manage issues and support adoption. Pricing Product Vision & Platform Build-Out Own the operating model and multi-year roadmap of the firm’s pricing capability including workflows, rule engines, exception management, approval paths, dashboards, audit trails and integration with the broader valuation ecosystem. Serve as the senior pricing advisor to the Head of Operations and valuation leadership, providing a clear point of view on risk and controls, as well as the capabilities required to support future growth. Enforce enterprise standards and ensure all valuation teams follow said standard decision so that local practices do not undermine firm-wide consistency or control. Pricing Governance, Controls & SOX Own and continually strengthen the pricing control framework, including SOX-relevant controls, evidence standards, approvals, segregation of duties, exception governance and control documentation. Ensure