Lead Python

Lead Python Developer

Location: 4x onsite: 20 Greenway Plaza #650, Houston, TX 77046 Very senior, hands-on builder, not an architect or manager. Someone who has:

• Built enterprise-wide trading platforms
• Worked directly with traders + risk teams
• Speaks trading/financial terminology fluently
• Can design AND code (Python daily)
• Acts as a strong individual contributor Think: "Senior trading systems engineer who can sit next to a trader and ship production code fast."

Core Requirements (must-have):

• 10–15 years engineering experience
• Heavy Python development
• Deep AWS (production architecture level)
• Built distributed, scalable enterprise systems

Trading / commodities / energy / financial markets systems

• Front Office
• Risk
• P&L
• Trade Capture
• Market Data

Strong communication (works directly with traders daily)

Good tenure/stability

Tech Environment

• Python
• AWS
• REST APIs
• Event-driven systems
• SQL
• Docker
• Kubernetes
• Linux
• Trading UIs

Nice to Have

• AWS Certified / Solutions Architect
• Bachelor's or Master's in CS/Engineering
• FIX protocol exposure

Position Summary:

We are looking for a hands-on IT Developer with experience in the Power & Gas Commodity markets of North America. You will work on full stack applications to support Front Office Trading across commodities and must be passionate about technology with experience developing enterprise-wide solutions. You will need to partner with end-users to understand process, requirements and analyze problems to design solutions and ultimately deliver tangible business value & benefit.

Key responsibilities

Own the design, development, and operation of mission-critical Front Office trading applications, including cloud-native data platforms hosted on Amazon Web Services (AWS). Architect and deliver high-performance, low-latency, and scalable solutions that directly support trading, risk management, P&L, and market analytics. Partner closely with Front Office, Trading, Risk, and Quant teams to translate complex business requirements into robust technical solutions. Lead the end-to-end delivery lifecycle: requirements analysis, solution design, prioritization, implementation, testing, deployment, and production support. Drive operational excellence through advanced monitoring, alerting, observability, automation, and predictive operations for 24x7 trading systems. Provide technical leadership and architectural guidance across globally distributed internal teams and third-party delivery partners. Ensure solutions adhere to security, performance, resiliency, and compliance standards expected in a regulated trading environment. Act as a technology ambassador for Mercuria IT, representing the organization internally and externally with credibility at senior business and technical levels.

Skills and Experience

BS or MS in Computer Science, Engineering, or equivalent practical experience. 10 years of experience designing and building enterprise-grade, distributed systems. Strong experience in commodities trading, energy trading, financial markets, or risk management systems is mandatory (Front Office, Risk, P&L, Trade Capture, Market Data). Proven expertise in Python with strong experience in Dash or modern UI/data visualization frameworks used in trading environments. Strong UI and data-driven application development experience for trader- and risk-facing tools. Deep hands-on experience with AWS, including (but not limited to): EKS, RDS, EC2, Lambda, S3, VPC, SageMaker, ECR, API Gateway, CloudFormation/ Terraform, CloudWatch, CloudTrail, SQS, SNS Strong SQL and relational data modeling expertise with databases such as PostgreSQL, SQL Server, Snowflake, MySQL. Experience with FIX 4.2 / 4.4 in electronic trading environments, covering order/execution workflows, market data, trade lifecycle management, and technical aspects such as session handling, validation, performance, and resiliency across financial instruments. Experience designing and building RESTful APIs, event-driven architectures, and JSON-based services. Strong DevOps and platform engineering mindset, with hands-on experience using: Docker, Kubernetes, GitLab, CI/CD pipelines Solid understanding of Linux/Unix environments. Strong ability to lead complex initiatives, influence stakeholders, and deliver under time-critical trading deadlines.