Discover your future
Make an impact
Launch your career
When you start your career at Optiver, you’ll immediately play a crucial role at a leading electronic trading company. Designed with your future in mind, you’ll collaborate with the industry’s best and brightest, owning projects that directly impact our trading systems.
Haven’t considered a career in finance? It’s time to rethink that. We welcome graduates from a diverse range of backgrounds and academic studies. From mathematics, physics, computer science, finance, engineering and more, there is no single path to a successful, lucrative career at Optiver.
Optiver Academy
From the training room to the trading floor in 12 weeks
At Optiver, we invest in your future from day one. Our global training is designed to equip all new graduate trading hires with the knowledge needed to make an immediate impact the moment you join your trading desk. And because we recruit problem solvers from all STEM backgrounds – no prior industry knowledge is required.
The first four weeks of training bring together all new graduate traders to learn the ins and outs of trading and options theory from Optiver’s Amsterdam office. As well as intensive classroom-based training, you’ll have the chance to network with your fellow traders while experiencing the best of what Amsterdam has to offer.
After returning to your local office, you’ll be begin a period of immersive simulated trading. You’ll build and test trading strategies using real-time live market data on Optiver’s simulated exchange, which is as close as you can get to the real-world experiences of trading. By the end of the 12 weeks, you’ll be trained, licensed and ready to hit the trading floor with the support of your new team.
Learning and developent
The ultimate learning experience
No matter what team you join, your career at Optiver begins with comprehensive specialised training. Through a combination of lectures, simulation trading and rotational development programmes, our full-time training courses are designed to set you up for success. You don’t need to have a prior understanding of financial markets to thrive – it’s our job to teach you.
After a technical deep dive, you’ll put your knowledge into practice and work on real-time projects alongside Optiver’s traders and engineers. From day one, we welcome you as an equal contributor to our teams and a key player in our mission to improve the markets.
Learning and development
The ultimate learning experience
No matter what team you join, your career at Optiver begins with comprehensive specialised training. Through a combination of lectures, simulation trading and rotational development programmes, our full-time training courses are designed to set you up for success. You don’t need to have a prior understanding of financial markets to thrive – it’s our job to teach you.
After a technical deep dive, you’ll put your knowledge into practice and work on real-time projects alongside Optiver’s traders and engineers. From day one, we welcome you as an equal contributor to our teams and a key player in our mission to improve the markets.
Debunking myths
There are lots of myths about trading, we prefer the reality
Myth: You need to have a degree in finance or experience in investing to work at a trading firm.
Reality: Very few traders or engineers at Optiver have a degree in finance. And many had no prior investing experience.
Myth: To succeed in trading, you must be willing to take risky bets.
Reality: Yes, trading can be risky. But at Optiver, our success is largely due to our ability to manage that risk.
Myth: As a trader, you’ll work 80+ hours a week, affording little to no time for life outside of work.
Reality: This may be true at some trading firms, but it is not true at Optiver. Our traders’ days are indeed very intense, but they generally wind down at a humane hour, leaving ample time to pursue interests outside of the office.
Myth: Traders seek loopholes to gain an unfair advantage in the market.
Reality: As a market maker, the opposite is true. We provide stability and liquidity to the market, which is good for everyone.
Myth: Trading is cutthroat.
Reality: This may be true at some firms, but Optiver’s culture is extremely collaborative.
meet the team
Meet some of the Optiver team: each mastered trading, none majored in it
Spend some time with the Optiver team and a couple things become clear: there is no single path to a successful, lucrative career here, and there is no single major that’s best suited to it. Watch the videos below to meet our team members and hear about their journeys to Optiver. You might just see yourself in them.
Meet Xiaoyu
Quantitative Trader
Meet Pepijn
Quantitative Trader
Meet Nicole
Site Reliability Engineer
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