What are the responsibilities and job description for the Backend Engineer (NYC) position at MLabs?
Location: New York, United States (Hybrid)
Hybrid | Full-time
Compensation: $180K - $320K
Our client is the largest decentralized perpetual exchange on Arbitrum, having processed over $20 billion in cumulative trading volume since its launch in late 2024. The platform enables leveraged trading of real-world assets, including commodities, forex, indices, and stocks—alongside cryptocurrency, bringing global markets on-chain with full self-custody.
A mid- to senior-level Backend Engineer is required to join an ambitious team focused on scaling a state-of-the-art infrastructure layer. This infrastructure is designed to allow engineering teams to self-serve 90% of their needs, enabling this role to focus entirely on high-level, high-impact projects. The successful candidate will collaborate closely with quants, infrastructure specialists, and data engineers to build a centralized pricing plane and an extremely dynamic pricing system that determines market competitiveness in real time.
Key Responsibilities
- Develop the Entity Service API: Build and maintain a core central configuration plane used to manage assets, mappings, market hours, data providers, smart contract parameters, algorithm parameters, and more.
- Build the Entity Service UI: Deliver an internal UI allowing team members to propose changes, review configurations, and leave comments, backed by robust Access Control Lists (ACL) and user management.
- Architect a Low-Latency Pricing System: Assist in designing and implementing a highly reliable, dynamic pricing engine capable of pricing every incoming transaction in real time to optimize liquidity attraction.
- Collaborate Across Teams: Partner with quants, infra, data, and backend engineers to establish a centralized pricing plane reflecting precise real-dollar values across every part of the system.
- Propose and Own Initiatives: Take stock of system needs, evaluate what delivers the most value, and propose independent workflows and paths forward.
Technical Experience
- Golang Expertise: Strong experience as a Go engineer with a deep understanding of how to leverage AI tools effectively in the development process while maintaining rigorous validation criteria.
- Data & Schema Design: Deep expertise with database schema design, evolution, and iteration.
- Financial Domain Knowledge: Direct experience with trading systems and a strong understanding of financial concepts, instruments, and market mechanics.
- Modern Tech Stack: Hands-on experience with Postgres, NATS, Redpanda, gRPC, REST APIs, and WebSockets.
Professional Attributes & Characteristics
- Security-Minded: A proactive approach to identifying and decreasing security attack vectors across the backend ecosystem.
- AI Power User: An engineer who utilizes AI effectively to accelerate workflows, validates all outputs critically, and implements strict technical guardrails rather than relying on unverified generation.
- Solution-Oriented: Focused on enabling internal teams and engineers to move as fast as possible by addressing requests and unblocking technical dependencies.
- Humble & Adaptive: A strong willingness to learn from quants, operations, and cross-functional engineering teams, maintaining flexibility without being attached to rigid legacy methods.
- Mission-Driven & Collaborative: A team-first competitor focused on overall organizational success, execution, and collective goals.
- Disagree and Commit: Open to voicing proposals and participating in rigorous debate, with a proven ability to fully commit to and execute decisions 100% once a path is finalized.
- Competitive base salary.
- Equity ownership options.
- Token incentives aligned with protocol growth.
- Opportunity to work at the forefront of DeFi and decentralized real-world asset (RWA) trading.
Due to the high volume of applications we anticipate, we regret that we are unable to provide individual feedback to all candidates. If you do not hear back from us within 4 weeks of your application, please assume that you have not been successful on this occasion. We genuinely appreciate your interest and wish you the best in your job search.
Commitment to Equality and Accessibility:
At MLabs, we are committed to offer equal opportunities to all candidates. We ensure no discrimination, accessible job adverts, and providing information in accessible formats. Our goal is to foster a diverse, inclusive workplace with equal opportunities for all. If you need any reasonable adjustments during any part of the hiring process or you would like to see the job-advert in an accessible format please let us know at the earliest opportunity by emailing human-resources@mlabs.city.
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Salary : $180,000 - $320,000