Director of Engineering, Clearing, Payments & Risk

Polymarket is the world's largest prediction market. In the US, Polymarket operates a CFTC-regulated exchange (DCM) and clearinghouse (DCO), and is building infrastructure to bring event contracts to a wider set of customers and partners. Engineering is small, senior, and close to the business. The Director of Engineering will lead the teams that move, clear, and protect customer funds on Polymarket US, own clearing, payments, and risk systems, and lead engineering for the Futures Commission Merchant (FCM) build. The role requires a manager who has built these systems before and understands the regulatory model behind them.

Responsibilities

Lead engineering for the FCM program end to end, including customer onboarding and account structure, customer fund segregation, margin and collateral, and the integration between the FCM and the clearinghouse; Own the clearing engine and post-trade path, including settlement, position and balance management, reconciliation, and the ledger; Own payments, including deposits and withdrawals across bank, card, and wallet rails, fraud and risk checks at authorization, and processor and banking partners; Build real-time risk controls, including pre-trade and pre-funding checks, exposure limits, and monitoring; Work daily with Clearing Operations, Treasury, Compliance, Legal, and DCO/FCM business leads to turn regulatory and operational requirements into auditable systems; Hire, grow, and manage a team of senior engineers, set the technical bar, run on-call, and stay close to the code to make good design calls

Requirements

8+ years in software engineering and 2+ years managing engineers, with a track record of shipping financial systems in production; Direct subject-matter experience with at least two of: FCM operations, clearing and settlement, payments infrastructure; Working knowledge of the CFTC framework for customer funds: segregation, margining, daily reconciliation and reporting, and what regulators expect from the systems that produce them; Strong instincts for money-movement correctness: double-entry ledgers, idempotency, reconciliation, and failure handling across external partners; Comfort leading a 0-to-1 build at startup speed while keeping the controls a regulated business needs; Clear written communication with both engineers and non-technical partners in operations, finance, and compliance

Nice to have

Experience standing up a new FCM, DCO, or derivatives clearing member, or taking one through a regulatory review; Background with margin methodologies (for example SPAN-style models) or collateral management; Experience with stablecoin or on-chain settlement rails alongside traditional banking rails; Hands-on experience in Go or another systems language used for high-throughput services

Benefits

Competitive salary and equity; Unlimited PTO; Health, vision, and dental coverage; 401(k) match; Full hardware setup: new MacBook Pro, large display, and accessories