Rank #3 · Exceptional opportunity
The global centre of gravity for high-frequency trading, options market making and low-latency engineering.
What is the quant market like in Chicago?
54 quant-classified roles are open in Chicago right now across 13 employers, read from their own career pages. The global centre of gravity for high-frequency trading, options market making and low-latency engineering. Main demand is in hft, market making, options, quant trading, c++, and compensation sits at roughly 97% of the New York benchmark for the equivalent role and seniority.
KnowQuant research deskUpdated 1 September 2026173 live vacancies in Chicago from 13 employersMethod 2026.1
Local context, written by the desk
Chicago hosts major derivatives venues, and several firms describe their Chicago presence in terms of that proximity. The firm-published detail below is what those employers say about themselves. Written from the company-published sources listed below and last checked 13 September 2026. This section is editorial: the vacancy counts and pay bands elsewhere on this page are produced separately and labelled there.
IMC's own Chicago page describes the city as home to the Chicago Mercantile Exchange and Cboe Global Markets and as the centre of the global derivatives marketplace, and states that it opened there in 2000. Where a specific team does options or futures market making, ask what share of its engineering work is exchange connectivity, risk systems and latency, and what share is research infrastructure. That differs by team, not by city.
IMC states on its Chicago page that the office has over 650 employees and is its largest location, and DRW publishes a Chicago headquarters at 540 W Madison Street. For any employer, it is worth asking whether the Chicago seat sits with the people who set priorities for your team or reports into another office.
Our reading, not a measurement: where a specific system is genuinely constrained by microseconds, expect questions about memory behaviour, allocation and measurement rather than framework knowledge. Ask the hiring team what the latency and throughput requirements of the actual system are, and read the firm's published interview guidance. Preparing by system constraint rather than by language is the case we make in our technical guide.
Counted from employer career pages, not job boards. These figures move as desks open and close roles, so the split below reflects the employers we track in Chicago rather than the whole market or an annual survey.
Live vacancies
173
Every open role we track in Chicago
Quant-index roles
54
Roles that meet our quant classification rules
Employers hiring
13
Distinct firms with an open seat here
Read live from each employer's own career page. Last full refresh September 2026. Compensation figures on this page are modelled and dated separately from these counts.
Modelled total compensation quoted in USD. The range spans every seniority we model for the role. The reference estimate is a separately configured modelled figure for the role, not the middle of that range and not an observed median.
| Role | Range | Modelled reference estimate |
|---|---|---|
| Quant Researcher | $223k – $2.4m | $461k |
| Quant Trader | $210k – $3.1m | $473k |
| Quant Developer | $175k – $1.2m | $330k |
| Quant Analyst | $121k – $679k | $223k |
| HFT / Low-Latency Engineer | $216k – $1.5m | $416k |
| Systematic Portfolio Manager | $485k – $15m | $1.2m |
| Software Engineer | $170k – $922k | $296k |
| Machine Learning Engineer | $194k – $1.5m | $378k |
| Data Engineer | $160k – $825k | $276k |
| Data Scientist | $146k – $601k | $238k |
| Site Reliability Engineer | $160k – $776k | $272k |
| Network and Infrastructure Engineer | $158k – $735k | $263k |
| Security Engineer | $155k – $776k | $267k |
| Trading Operations Analyst | $92k – $485k | $170k |
| Risk Manager | $126k – $728k | $233k |
| Compliance Officer | $107k – $631k | $199k |
| Fund Finance and Accounting | $97k – $728k | $194k |
| Technical Recruiter | $92k – $582k | $179k |
Multi-strategy platform
quant-researcher · quant-developer · quant-trader · portfolio-manager
Proprietary trading
quant-researcher · quant-developer · hft-engineer
Proprietary trading
hft-engineer · quant-researcher · quant-trader
Market maker
quant-trader · quant-developer · hft-engineer · quant-researcher
Market maker
quant-trader · quant-developer · hft-engineer
Proprietary trading
quant-trader · quant-researcher · hft-engineer · quant-developer
Market maker
quant-trader · quant-researcher · quant-developer
Rankings, compensation and hiring firms for each discipline traded in Chicago.
Direct answers, each one tied to the Chicago figures on this page.
Modelled total compensation for a quantitative researcher in Chicago runs $223k – $2.4m across the seniorities we model (USD), which is about 97% of the New York benchmark for the same role and seniority. Every other role is priced in the table above.
7 of the firms we track run a Chicago desk, including Citadel / Citadel Securities, Hudson River Trading, Jump Trading. Each firm profile lists the desks it staffs locally and the disciplines it recruits for.
HFT, market making, options, quant trading, C++. The strategies concentrated here are high-frequency trading, market making, options, latency arbitrage, which shapes both the skills desks screen for and the pay dispersion between them.
Chicago is one of the 17 hub markets we price, and on the roles we currently track it shows exceptional advertised demand. That is our own editorial read of tracked vacancies, not a global ranking of opportunity. Compare the pay index of 97 against local tax and cost of living, and check current official guidance on visas and tax, before treating a headline number as an improvement.
Live roles are read from employer career pages and refreshed continuously. The pay bands carry method 2026.1, last reviewed September 2026, and are frozen each quarter as a dated edition you can cite.
Both, and they are labelled. Where an advert states pay we use the stated figure. Where it does not, the band is modelled from publicly reported compensation data and role benchmarking, and shown as a range rather than a single number.
Each one is a standalone page with the working shown, kept in step with the figures above.
A quant researcher in Chicago earns a median of $461k in annual total compensation, within a full band of $223k to $2.4m.
A quant trader in Chicago earns a median of $473k in annual total compensation, within a full band of $210k to $3.1m.
A quant developer in Chicago earns a median of $330k in annual total compensation, within a full band of $175k to $1.2m.
A quant analyst in Chicago earns a median of $223k in annual total compensation, within a full band of $121k to $679k.
A hft / low-latency engineer in Chicago earns a median of $416k in annual total compensation, within a full band of $216k to $1.5m.
A systematic portfolio manager in Chicago earns a median of $1.2m in annual total compensation, within a full band of $485k to $15m.
Pay, tax drag and hiring depth for Chicago set against the markets it is most often weighed against.
KnowQuant Quant Compensation Benchmark, Q3 2026 edition, method 2026.1. https://www.know-quant.com/markets/chicago
Free to quote and republish with attribution and a link to the source page, under our terms. Method 2026.1, last reviewed 1 September 2026. The methodology sets out how each band is built and what it excludes.
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Weekly market movements
The dated market call: which desks opened seats, where pay shifted, and which markets tightened. Written by the research desk, sent Monday, and nothing else.
Figures are expressed as annual total compensation (base salary plus expected performance bonus) in the reference market's local currency, converted from a US dollar base. They describe typical market ranges rather than any individual offer, and exclude sign-on payments, deferred equity and carried interest. Portfolio-manager figures reflect formulaic profit-share arrangements and are therefore far more dispersed than any other role.
KnowQuantIndex 2026.1 · Updated September 2026
Modelled bands describe the market, not an individual offer. Where an employer states pay, the stated figure is used and labelled as such.
Chicago market report · KnowQuant 2026.1