I had the exciting opportunity to collaborate with a talented team on a project that significantly enhanced the company’s trading capabilities. We developed and maintained a comprehensive suite of tools, including a client-side and market-side booking service, an off-order-book trade reporting engine, and a robust trade manager/repository.

Direct Market Access for Enhanced Trading:

Our market-side booking service revolutionized how traders interacted with the market. By enabling direct order placement with market makers, we empowered our team with:

  • Faster Execution: Direct access eliminated the intermediary steps of traditional order routing, leading to significantly faster trade execution.
  • Improved Pricing: Direct engagement with market makers fostered greater price transparency and the potential for more favorable pricing.
  • Enhanced Control: Traders gained more control over their orders, enabling them to react quickly to market dynamics and execute their strategies more effectively.

Streamlined Trade Reporting and Management:

The off-order-book trade reporting engine and trade manager/repository provided essential tools for efficient trade processing and oversight:

  • Automated Reporting: The reporting engine streamlined the often cumbersome process of trade reporting, reducing manual effort and improving accuracy.
  • Centralized Trade Repository: The trade manager/repository provided a single source of truth for all trade data, simplifying reconciliation and analysis.

Embracing Innovation While Addressing Challenges:

The team’s commitment to innovation led to the development of highly optimized core libraries designed for zero garbage collection, low latency, and high throughput. These libraries delivered impressive performance when operating as designed. However, we recognized that their complexity presented challenges for maintainability and collaboration within a larger development team.

Collaborative Problem-Solving and Feature Enhancement:

I had the privilege of contributing to this project by working closely with the team to address these challenges. We focused on debugging existing issues and introducing new functionality while navigating the complexities of the in-house libraries. Our collaborative efforts, utilizing a tech stack encompassing Java, Groovy, Spring, FIX, JUnit, MSSQL, and JRebel, resulted in a more robust and maintainable platform.