Head of Market Data Development & Engineering

Selby Jennings; City Of London; On-site; GBP 180,000 - 280,000; Full time

Job summary

Selby Jennings seeks a senior Head of Market Data Engineering to own data strategy, governance and cost optimisation across crypto and traditional assets. You will bridge trading desks and technology, solving complex problems in a fast-moving global setting.

You will lead a small team, design a central Market Data API, and assure data quality, security and performance end-to-end for trading, research and risk platforms.

Qualifications

• 10+ years building bespoke real-time market data platforms at a trading firm, hedge fund or financial institution
• Strong knowledge of major market data vendors, exchanges and licensing models
• Solid understanding of trading workflows across asset classes and data types
• Experience with low-latency systems, market data feeds, APIs and streaming technologies
• Strong analytical and problem-solving skills with attention to detail
• Excellent communication with both technical and business audiences

Responsibilities

• Set and deliver a single market data strategy for crypto and traditional markets
• Architect scalable, low-latency data platform handling tick, order book and on-chain data
• Lead build vs. buy assessments for in-house vs. third-party platforms
• Manage a small development team while coding
• Design and build a central Market Data API
• Own the firm-wide market data messaging layer used by internal apps
• Develop relationships with crypto exchanges and data providers
• Support vendor management on terms, licensing and exchange agreements
• Deliver clean, normalised datasets across fragmented venues
• Oversee real-time ingestion of order books, trades, reference data and on-chain metrics
• Put monitoring to track data accuracy and completeness
• Own and optimise global market data spend and vendor consolidation
• Introduce usage tracking and chargeback models
• Collaborate with infrastructure on data pipelines and hybrid environments
• Ensure regulatory compliance including entitlements and governance
• Engage with stakeholders to deliver data solutions
• Be the internal subject matter expert on crypto and cross-asset market data
• Hire and develop an engineering team and promote automation

Skills

Real-time market data

Low-latency systems

Trading workflows knowledge

Data governance

Analytical thinking

Tools

Kdb+

Databricks

APIs

Job description

We are looking for a senior Head of Market Data Engineering to own how the business builds, sources, governs and optimises market data across crypto and traditional asset classes. The position bridges the trading desk and technology. It is responsible for making sure the data behind trading, research and risk platforms is high quality, compliant, cost-efficient and high-performing.

You will partner with traders, internal stakeholders and external providers to deliver key projects that move the business forward. The role suits a hands-on engineering leader who enjoys solving complex problems in a fast-moving, global setting.

Key Responsibilities

Strategy and Architecture

• Set and deliver a single market data strategy covering centralised and decentralised crypto venues as well as traditional markets
• Architect a scalable, low-latency data platform that handles tick data, order book data and on-chain data
• Lead build vs. buy assessments for in-house platforms vs. third-party providers

Engineering Leadership and Hands-On Delivery

• Manage a small development team while staying actively involved in coding
• Design and build a central Market Data API that sits in front of all data sources, including in-house feed handlers, vendor platforms, kdb+ and Databricks
• Own the firm-wide market data messaging layer used by internal applications

Crypto Data and Vendor Relationships

• Develop relationships with crypto exchanges such as Coinbase, Binance, OKX and Deribit, along with data aggregators and node providers
• Support the vendor management function on commercial terms, licensing and exchange agreements for both crypto and traditional markets

Data Quality, Normalisation and Coverage

• Deliver clean, normalised datasets across fragmented crypto venues, including symbol mapping, schema standardisation and latency benchmarking
• Oversee real-time ingestion of order books, trades, reference data, funding rates and on-chain metrics
• Put monitoring and alerting in place to track data accuracy and completeness

Cost Control

• Own and optimise the global market data spend across crypto and traditional vendors
• Find savings through vendor consolidation, direct exchange connectivity and internally built solutions
• Introduce usage tracking and chargeback models where it makes sense

Infrastructure

• Work with infrastructure teams on the connectivity and pipelines needed to bring data into the firm
• Support a hybrid on-premise and cloud environment with strong resilience, redundancy and scalability
• Make data available for research, backtesting and live trading systems

Regulatory and Compliance

• Ensure adherence to exchange licensing, redistribution requirements and developing crypto regulation
• Implement entitlements, audit trails and governance controls across all data consumption

Stakeholder Engagement

• Partner with trading, quant research, risk and portfolio management to deliver data solutions
• Support the onboarding of new venues, products (including perpetuals and options) and strategies
• Be the internal subject matter expert on crypto and cross-asset market data

Team Building and Culture

• Hire and develop a strong engineering team
• Define best practice for onboarding, validating and managing market data through its lifecycle
• Promote innovation, automation and operational excellence
• Encourage practical use of AI across the team, using tools such as generative AI, automation platforms and data copilots to improve productivity, decision-making and quality of output

Requirements

• 10+ years building bespoke real-time market data platforms at a trading firm, hedge fund or financial institution
• Strong knowledge of the main market data vendors, exchanges and licensing models
• Solid understanding of trading workflows across asset classes (equities, futures, options, FX, fixed income) and data types (real-time, reference, historical)
• Experience with low-latency systems, market data feeds, APIs and streaming technologies
• Strong analytical and problem-solving skills with close attention to detail
• Excellent communication skills, and comfortable working with both technical and business audiences

Nice to Have

• Exposure to on-chain data, blockchain nodes and crypto data providers