Systematic Options Trader

Citadel Securities; New York (NY); On-site; USD 180,000 - 400,000; Full time

Job summary

Citadel Securities seeks a Systematic Options Trader to join a global team responsible for the development, advancement, and day-to-day management of quantitative systematic trading strategies. The role balances operational, research, and engineering duties across real-time risk management, pricing refinements, and strategy monitoring.

Located in New York or Miami, you will work with alpha researchers, low-latency developers, SREs, and infrastructure teams to evolve the platform and respond to

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in a STEM or economics program from a top institution.
• Excellent problem-solving and strategic decision-making; ability to make informed and defensible decisions in a fast-paced trading environment.
• Proficiency in Python and associated data science libraries; comfortable writing code to subscribe, process, and display data in real time.
• Track record of building and operating complex trading strategies.
• Detail-oriented with excellent written and oral communication skills.

Responsibilities

• Build a deep understanding of the systematic market making business, partnering with engineers, researchers, and infrastructure teams.
• Identify new ways to instrument and measure behaviors to drive participation and profitability.
• Guide the evolution of the platform and its component strategies.
• Respond to outsized market flows by adjusting pricing, risk tolerance, and strategy parameters.
• Own risk management protections and have authority over trading activities.

Skills

Problem-solving

Strategic decision-making

Communication

Trading domain knowledge

Education

Bachelor's degree in STEM or Economics

Tools

Python

Kdb+/Q

Linux

SQL

Git

VS Code

Job description

As a Systematic Options Trader, you will join our global team of experts responsible for the innovation, advancement, and day-to-day management of our quantitative systematic trading strategies. You will balance your time between operational, research, and engineering responsibilities. Operational responsibilities include real-time risk management, responding to changing market conditions and risk flows, pricing refinements, and the monitoring of strategy performance. On the research side, you will define the KPIs to be monitored, instrument packet-by-packet inspection of strategy behavior, create new evidence-based parameterization of existing algos as well as creating entirely new solutions. We’re looking for extraordinary traders who are committed to our core values: winning, acting with integrity, continuously learning, and cultivating a meritocracy.

Location:

New York or Miami

Responsibilities:

• Build a deep understanding of the systematic marking making business, partnering with low-latency developers, alpha researchers, site reliability engineers, pricing researchers, and infrastructure developers
• Identify new ways of instrumenting and measuring existing systematic behaviors to drive participation and profitability. Constantly seek out new ways to monitor our own behavior as well as that of competitors
• Guide the evolution of the platform and its component strategies
• React to outsized market flows and regime shifts in real time by adjusting a combination of pricing, risk tolerance and strategy parameters
• Identify any under-participation in opportunity and formulate a plan to capture it
• Operational excellence in all aspects
• Own the definition and setting of risk management protections and have authority over trading activities

Qualifications:

• Bachelor’s degree in a STEM or economics program from a top institution
• Excellent problem-solving and strategic decision-making; ability to make informed and defensible decisions in a fast-paced trading environment
• Proficiency in python and associated data science libraries (pandas/polars, scikit, plotly/matplotlib, ...). Must be comfortable writing code to subscribe, process, and display data in soft real-time. Kdb+/Q a plus but not required. Familiarity with Linux, SQL, Git, and VS Code
• Track record of building and operating complex trading strategies
• Detail-oriented with excellent written and oral communication skills