Trading Automation Specialist

Optiver•Chicago, IL

6d•Onsite

About The Position

Optiver is seeking a Trading Automation Specialist responsible for the daily operations, automation, and continuous improvement of our market making activity in Chicago. This role is a unique opportunity in the industry to build range across data, coding, and trading, find where your edge lies, and then go deep and scale your impact. You will be expected to take ownership of critical workstreams and own solving them in real time on the desk. This role sits closer to the business than a software engineer and closer to the systems than a trader, acting as the connective tissue between them.

Requirements

3+ years of experience in trading operations, trading technology, quantitative finance, or a closely related field
Bachelor’s degree in a STEM field (Computer Science, Engineering, Mathematics, Physics, or related)
Strong programming skills in Python or similar languages, with experience building automation and tooling
Familiarity with electronic trading systems, market microstructure, and the mechanics of market making
Excellent analytical, quantitative, and problem-solving abilities
Outstanding communication skills with a proven ability to work cross-functionally

Responsibilities

Automate the desk — build the workflows and tooling traders rely on every session; eliminate manual work and reduce operational risk
Work with data — build the pipelines and analytics that turn market and order-flow data into trading decisions
Own reliability — take end-to-end ownership of core trading automation systems, act as an escalation point, and lead root-cause analysis
Partner across the floor — translate operational insight into system improvements alongside traders, researchers, and engineers
Find and scale your edge — use breadth across data, code, and markets to set direction where your impact is greatest