The Virtu Financial Interview Process

Virtu Financial's public listing shapes its hiring, and candidates report a process weighted toward statistics, market structure, and a formal loop.

Virtu Financial hires through an online application and assessment, one or two technical phone interviews, and an onsite loop of three to five interviews that covers trading or engineering fundamentals alongside a conversation about the firm's business. As a publicly traded company since its 2015 initial public offering, Virtu Financial runs a more formally structured recruiting process than many private trading firms, with defined stages and documented feedback between rounds.

Virtu Financial makes markets across equities, exchange-traded funds, options, fixed income, currencies, and commodities on more than fifty venues in over thirty countries. The firm's edge combines market making with an execution services business, expanded significantly through its 2017 acquisition of KCG Holdings, which added agency execution and analytics alongside Virtu's own principal trading.

That dual structure means candidates may interview for roles on the purely quantitative market-making side or for roles closer to the execution and analytics business, and the two paths test somewhat different skills even though both sit under the same public company.

Applicants typically complete an online application and, for technical roles, a coding or quantitative assessment before any live interview. A first phone screen with a recruiter or hiring manager checks background and motivation, followed by one or two technical interviews focused on the specific desk or engineering team.

The onsite loop, when scheduled in person at the New York headquarters or a regional office, generally includes a market making or coding case, a statistics and probability round, a conversation with a senior trader or engineer about a past project, and a final conversation with human resources or leadership.