JobsChicago Trading Company

Senior Engineer - Data Ingestion

Chicago Trading Company · Chicago, IL · Technology

Posted Sep 17, 2026 · We last checked this listing on Sep 20, 2026

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Likely interview questions for this role

Written from this job description, not a generic list. Each one notes what the interviewer is really checking.

Behavioral

Tell me about a time you found a data quality issue that nobody had noticed yet. How did you catch it and what did you build so it wouldn't happen again?

proactive ownership versus reactive bug-fixing mindset

Describe a situation where a trader or researcher asked you for something that, technically, was a bad idea. How did you handle that conversation?

ability to push back constructively on non-technical stakeholders without damaging the relationship

Tell me about a time you disagreed with another engineer on the data team about how to solve a problem. What happened?

collaboration style and how they resolve technical conflict within a team

Technical

Tell me about a data pipeline you built or owned that handled hundreds of terabytes or more. What did the architecture look like, and where did it break under load?

whether the candidate has real hands-on scale experience versus theoretical knowledge

Walk me through how you would design a pipeline to ingest tick-level market data and make it queryable by both traders and quants with very different latency needs.

ability to balance conflicting stakeholder requirements in a concrete system design

What's your experience with open table formats like Iceberg or Delta, and query engines like Trino or Spark? Tell me about a specific decision you made using one of these tools.

depth versus buzzword familiarity with modern data platform tooling

Write or talk through a SQL query that would detect a sudden shift in data distribution for a source feed, something that might signal an upstream data quality problem.

raw SQL fluency and practical data quality instincts

Tell me about the most complex system you've designed from scratch. What tradeoffs did you make between cost, reliability, and speed?

software architecture judgment and cost-awareness at scale

Have you worked with cloud infrastructure or HPC workloads for data processing? Walk me through a specific project where you had to optimize for either cost or performance.

concrete cloud/HPC experience rather than resume keyword matching

Situational

Say a trader flags that a key metric on their dashboard looks wrong right before market open. How do you figure out if it's a source data issue, a transformation bug, or something downstream, and what do you do in the moment versus after?

triage instincts under time pressure and whether they separate firefighting from root-cause work

How would you approach migrating an existing pipeline that traders currently depend on daily onto a new platform, without disrupting their workflow?

risk management and communication skills during infrastructure change

How do you think about SLAs for data pipelines that feed both junior traders checking dashboards and executives making bigger calls? Does the answer change based on who's using it?

whether they can prioritize competing service-level demands across a broad user base

If you had to lower compute and storage costs across the firm's data pipelines without hurting reliability, where would you start looking?

practical optimization thinking and understanding of cost drivers in large pipelines

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The full job description

As published by Chicago Trading Company.

<div class="content-intro"><p>Chicago Trading Company (CTC) is a premier proprietary trading firm specializing in options market making. &nbsp;Our collaborative culture fuels innovation in quantitative research, systematic trading strategies, and cutting-edge trading technology. &nbsp;For over three decades CTC has provided critical liquidity across derivatives exchanges worldwide - making them fairer, more transparent, and more efficient.</p> <p>We strive to be the most innovative firm in the industry today, tomorrow, and long into the future while upholding ethical excellence. We believe that CTC makes a positive impact on the markets, the lives of our employees, and all the communities to which we belong. Started in 1995 by a team of forward-thinking Traders, we are proud to call ourselves an industry leader that keeps making markets and each other better.</p></div><p>As an engineer for the Data Ingest team, you will build and maintain the core, top-level data assets that power our research platforms. These are used by every desk at CTC, from junior traders to executives. Because of this broad user base, the product’s surface area is extensive. By ensuring high quality data in a timely fashion, you help support data-driven decision-making on daily basis.</p> <p><strong>WHAT YOU'LL DO</strong></p> <ul> <li>Own the quality, reliability, and overall health of our source data pipelines.</li> <li>Work closely with Traders and Quantitative Researchers to understand their needs, and how they use our final data products.</li> <li>Act as the data-delivery expert for your stakeholders, and design the most reliable and efficient way to source the data they need.</li> <li>Optimize existing pipelines to improve SLA for users and lower the compute and storage footprint across the firm.</li> <li>Migrate existing pipelines onto modern data platforms and hardware, and improve the process for future migrations.</li> <li>Collaborate with the broader data organization to improve our overall platform offering and functionality.</li> <li>Detect source data quality issues that lead to incorrect downstream metrics, and partner with data owners to build tools that surface and resolve these issues before users see them.</li> </ul> <p><strong>WHAT WE'RE LOOKING FOR</strong></p> <ul> <li>Hands-on experience building and operating large-scale data pipelines, ideally in the hundreds of terabytes to petabytes range.</li> <li>Strong software architecture and large-scale system design skills.</li> <li>Strong proficiency in SQL and in object-oriented languages such as Python.</li> <li>Hands-on experience with at least one major cloud provider (AWS, Azure, GCP) and/or HPC workloads.</li> <li>Strong interpersonal skills and the ability to work in a team environment.</li> </ul> <p><strong>NICE TO HAVE</strong></p> <ul> <li>Experience with tick capture, market data, or trading industry data (options, equities, futures).</li> <li>C++.</li> <li>Experience with data observability and data quality tooling, including diagnosing source data problems.</li> <li>Experience with open table formats such as Iceberg or Delta, and with query engines such as Trino, Spark, or DuckDB.</li> </ul> <p>&nbsp;</p><div class="content-pay-transparency"><div class="pay-input"><div class="description"><p><strong>Compensation</strong></p> <p>The salary range for this role is listed below. This role is also eligible for an annual discretionary bonus. The discretionary bonus will be dependent upon the individual’s skills, experience, qualifications, and firm performance.&nbsp;</p></div><div class="title">Salary Range</div><div class="pay-range"><span>$200,000</span><span class="divider">&mdash;</span><span>$250,000 USD</span></div></div></div><div class="content-conclusion"><p>Most teams at CTC, with the exception of Trading, follow a hybrid workplace model, subject to change based on business need.</p> <p><strong>Our Benefits&nbsp;</strong></p> <p>We strongly believe in the well-being of our employees and their families so we offer outstanding benefits to support you both professionally and personally. These benefits include generous time off, insurance coverage, paid parental leave, free breakfast and lunch (plus healthy snacks, of course), wellness reimbursement, and a variety of other benefits focused on providing the best employee experience.&nbsp;</p> <p><em>(Disclaimer: interns and contractors are not eligible for benefits at CTC)&nbsp;</em></p> <p><strong>Our Commitment to Diversity, Equity and Inclusion</strong></p> <p>At CTC, we aim to cultivate a workplace that celebrates diversity and each person feels included, engaged and empowered. Where each of us feels we belong. We are committed to having a diverse workforce and are proud to be an equal opportunity employer. CTC does not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, sex, gender, gender expression, sexual orientation, age, marital status, veteran status, or disability status. We will ensure that individuals with disabilities are provided reasonable accommodation to participate in the job application or interview process, to perform crucial job functions, and to receive other benefits and privileges of employment.&nbsp;</p> <p>If you have a disability and believe you need a reasonable accommodation in order to search for a job opening or to apply for a position, please contact us at info@chicagotrading.com. Note that emails sent to this email account for non-disability related issues, such as following up on an application, will not receive a response.</p> <p><strong>Use of Artificial Intelligence (AI)</strong></p> <p>Information submitted by job applicants may be subject to review and analysis by automated systems, including Artificial Intelligence (AI), as part of the recruitment process. Such systems are utilized to enhance the efficiency and effectiveness of our hiring procedures. Applicants are advised that any information provided may be evaluated by AI tools to ensure an equitable and thorough assessment.</p></div>

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