Senior Specialty Protocol Engineer

Wells Fargo & Company•Concord, CA

3d•$119,000 - $224,000•Hybrid

About The Position

Wells Fargo is seeking several Senior Specialty Software Developers (Protocol Engineers) to contribute to a next-generation Digital Asset Platform designed to solve the most critical challenge in institutional finance: achieving strict regulatory compliance without compromising transaction confidentiality. Wells Fargo is moving beyond standard public blockchains to build a custom, application-specific infrastructure. Our platform utilizes advanced cryptography to enable "auditable privacy"—allowing regulated institutions to settle digital assets securely while preserving strategic confidentiality, without relying on centralized intermediaries. As a Senior Protocol Engineer, you will be responsible for architecting the core settlement engine. You'll work at the intersection of distributed systems and applied cryptography, translating complex mathematical proofs into high-performance, production-grade Go code. Why apply to this job? To work on complex problems: You won't be building another yield farm copycat. You'll be solving fundamental privacy/compliance contradictions in the global financial system High-Impact Engineering: Your code will secure high-value institutional transactions Technical Autonomy: You'll play a key role in architectural decisions, choosing the right curves, libraries, and design patterns

Requirements

4+ years of Specialty Software Engineering experience, or equivalent demonstrated through one or a combination of the following: work experience, training, military experience, education
Systems Engineering: 3+ years of experience in backend or systems programming, with expert-level proficiency in Go (Golang)
Applied Cryptography: 6+ months of experience with Elliptic Curve Cryptography (ECC)
Distributed Systems: 1+ year of experience with BFT consensus algorithms, P2P networking, and state replication

Nice To Haves

Blockchain Core: Deep experience with Cosmos SDK and CometBFT. Comfort building custom modules and modifying consensus logic, not just deploying smart contracts
Pedersen Commitments (Homomorphic encryption properties)
Zero-Knowledge Proofs (specifically Bulletproofs or Sigma protocols)
Math-to-Code: Demonstrated ability to read academic whitepapers/preprints and translate mathematical specifications into functioning code
Experience with MPC (Multi-Party Computation) or Verifiable Secret Sharing (VSS) schemes
Familiarity with the Ristretto255 curve or libraries like gnark-crypto
Background in FinTech, payment systems, or high-frequency trading platforms
Understanding of the Account Model vs. UTXO Model trade-offs in privacy-preserving ledgers

Responsibilities

Core Protocol Development: Architect and build a custom blockchain application using Go, Cosmos SDK, and CometBFT (Tendermint)
Cryptographic Implementation: Implement and optimize privacy-preserving primitives, specifically Pedersen Commitments and Bulletproofs (Range Proofs), ensuring no trusted setup is required
Consensus Customization: Engineer custom ABCI++ extensions (specifically PrepareProposal and Vote Extensions) to implement an on-chain Multi-Party Computation (MPC) mixing network.
State Machine Design: Design a custom KVStore state machine that manages homomorphic encrypted balances (Elliptic Curve points) instead of plaintext integers.
Performance Engineering: Optimize cryptographic operations (scalar multiplication, point addition) for low latency and high throughput in a distributed environment.
Auditing Infrastructure: Build secure off-chain query layers and "view key" mechanisms that allow for granular, permissioned regulatory auditing.