Senior Software Engineer - Market Data; Low-Latency Trading Systems

Overview

Description
We are seeking an experienced and highly skilled Senior Software Engineer with a proactive growth mindset to join our core trading technology team as a Technical Lead. In this critical role, you will be instrumental in designing, developing, and optimizing the ultra-low latency, high-throughput systems that power our trading strategies. This is a unique opportunity to work across the full software development lifecycle while closely collaborating with quantitative researchers to improve our ability to provide low latency intelligence to our trading systems.

Department: Technology
Location: Chicago, IL

• System Design & Development:
  Lead the architectural design and hands-on implementation of core components for our electronic trading platform, including exchange connectivity, market data handlers, order execution engines, and risk management systems.
• Performance Engineering:
  Drive initiatives to continuously optimize the latency and throughput of our trading applications, including performance analysis, profiling, and tuning at all levels of the stack.
• Collaboration & Innovation:
  Partner with quantitative researchers and traders to translate trading strategies into optimized software, and evaluate new technologies to keep the infrastructure at the forefront.
• Reliability & Support:
  Build fault-tolerant and resilient systems; participate in deployment, monitoring, and provide expert-level support for production systems to ensure maximum uptime and stability.
• Code Quality & Best Practices:
  Uphold high standards for code quality, testability, and maintainability through code reviews, automated testing, and modern software engineering practices.
• Mentorship:
  Act as a technical leader and mentor to less experienced engineers, guiding development efforts and fostering a collaborative and growth-oriented environment.

• Bachelor's or Master's degree in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, or a closely related technical field.
• 5+ years of professional software development experience with a focus on high-performance, low-latency systems.
• Expert-level proficiency in modern C++ (C++17/20 preferred) with strong knowledge of multi-threading, concurrency, memory management, and optimization techniques.
• Solid understanding of operating system internals (Linux preferred), network programming (TCP/IP, UDP, multicast), and hardware interactions.
• Experience with hardware acceleration (FPGA/GPU programming).
• Exposure to distributed systems and messaging technologies.
• Experience with system-level debugging, profiling, and performance tuning tools.
• Strong foundation in data structures, algorithms, and computational complexity.
• Experience with Python for automation, analysis, and tooling.
• Excellent problem-solving skills and the ability to troubleshoot complex issues in a real-time environment.
• Strong communication skills and the ability to collaborate with technical and non-technical stakeholders.
• Proactive, self-motivated, and able to take ownership from concept to deployment.

• Highly competitive salary & bonus opportunity
• Generous paid time off and flexible scheduling
• 100% coverage of medical, dental, vision, life, and disability benefits for single coverage
• Generous Paid Parental Leave
• Retirement Plans: 401K and Roth 401K
• Profit sharing plan
• Long- and short-term disability

• Free breakfast and lunch from our in-house kitchen with rotating menus
• On-site gym with a subsidized membership
• Frequent company outings
• Opportunity to support organizations in the Chicagoland area

The base compensation range for this role is approximately $125,000-$180,000 contingent on experience. Wolverine Trading's total compensation model includes base salary and an annual discretionary bonus.