Who We Are

Optiver is a global market maker founded in Amsterdam, with offices in London, Chicago, Austin, New York, Sydney, Shanghai, Hong Kong, Singapore, Taipei and Mumbai. Established in 1986, today we are a leading liquidity provider, with close to 2,000 employees in offices around the world, united in our commitment to improve the market through competitive pricing, execution and risk management. By providing liquidity on multiple exchanges across the world in various financial instruments we participate in the safeguarding of healthy and efficient markets. We provide liquidity to financial markets using our own capital, at our own risk, trading a wide range of products: listed derivatives, cash equities, ETFs, bonds and foreign currencies.

Optiver’s Sydney office is one of the primary players within Asian markets, trading a range of products. Established in 1996, we're an active participant on the Hong Kong, Korea, Singapore, Taiwan and Japan exchanges, and act as Optiver’s APAC head office. 

 

What You’ll Do

Optiver is looking for a senior engineer to work with our low latency execution platforms, including software that interfaces directly with FPGA-based components. Our execution platforms are responsible for placing orders from auto-trading algorithms with as low a latency as possible, implementing risk boundary checks, order management and exchange connectivity.

As a senior engineer you will be responsible for working with internal stakeholders across the company including trading, risk, compliance and research teams to design key features in our execution applications and own their implementation end-to-end. Our engineers design, implement, test, and deploy their ideas, and feel the success of their work in live trading markets across Asia. Trade execution in Asia isn’t simple - you’ll study exchange microstructure in depth and use your creativity to invent new ways to optimise order placement and packet delivery. Our development is often fast paced, fulfilling, and rewarding, with the ability to work on features and see them running in live markets within days.

You will:

• Partner with trading and research teams to understand our trade execution performance and look for inventive ways to boost trade execution rates, ensuring Optiver retains its number one status in the market.

• Flex your understanding of computer science fundamentals to optimise C++ applications to perform with high order throughput and low end-to-end latency.

• Directly interface with the live production environment to get fast feedback from live trading and feel the impact of your work.

• Ensure quality is maintained throughout our systems by contributing to code reviews and the design of last-line-of-defence systems.

• Provide advice and guidance to junior developers.

 

Who you are

We’re looking for candidates:

• With at least 5 years' experience as a software engineer working with performance-critical high throughput or low latency systems.

• Who are skilled at object-oriented programming in C++, or Java/C# with a strong desire to work in C++.

• Who have a strong understanding of network technologies (10G Ethernet, UDP, TCP) and Linux networking.

• Who have an excellent understanding of computer science fundamentals like operating systems, data structures and algorithms.

• Who are excited by technically challenging problems.

• Who embrace AI tools for parts of their role, without sacrificing code quality or runtime performance.

If any of these describe you, we’re even more excited to talk to you:

• Highly skilled in C++ development.

• Experienced working in a high frequency trading firm.

 

What You’ll Get

You’ll join a culture of collaboration and excellence, where you’ll be surrounded by curious thinkers and creative problem solvers. Driven by a passion for continuous improvement, you’ll thrive in a supportive, high-performing environment alongside talented colleagues, working collectively to tackle some of the most complex problems in the financial markets.

In return for your expertise, you will have access to a range of Optiver perks, including:

• A performance-based bonus structure unmatched anywhere in the industry. We combine our profits across desks, teams and offices into a global profit pool, fostering a truly collaborative environment.

• The chance to work alongside diverse and intelligent peers in a rewarding environment.

• Training, mentorship and personal development opportunities.

• Daily breakfast, lunch and an in-house barista.

• Gym membership plus weekly in-house chair massages.

• Regular social events, including a company trip every two years.

• Guided relocation, a competitive relocation package and visa sponsorship where necessary.

 

Optiver is committed to diversity and inclusion. We encourage applications from candidates of all backgrounds, and welcome requests for reasonable adjustments during the process.

Questions? Get in touch with the recruitment team at [email protected]

mailto:careers@optiv...

mailto:careers@optiv...