Who We Are:
Alpaca is a US-headquartered, global leader in agent-first brokerage infrastructure for stocks, ETFs, options, crypto, fixed income, 24/5 trading, and more.
Amongst our subsidiaries, Alpaca is a licensed financial services company, serving hundreds of financial institutions across 40 countries with our institutional-grade APIs. This includes broker-dealers, investment advisors, wealth managers, hedge funds, and crypto exchanges, totalling over 10 million brokerage accounts.
Our global team is a diverse group of experienced engineers, traders, and brokerage professionals who are working to achieve our mission of opening financial services to everyone on the planet. We're deeply committed to open-source contributions and fostering a vibrant community, continuously enhancing our award-winning, developer-friendly API and the robust infrastructure behind it.
Alpaca is proudly backed by $400 million in funding from top-tier global investors including Portage Ventures, Spark Capital, Tribe Capital, Social Leverage, Horizons Ventures, Opera Tech Ventures, SBI Group, Derayah Financial, Unbound, Peak XV, Elefund, and Y Combinator.
Our Team Members:
We're a dynamic team of 400+ globally distributed members who thrive working from our favorite places around the world, with teammates spanning the USA, Canada, Japan, Hungary, Nigeria, Brazil, the UK, and beyond!
We're searching for passionate individuals eager to contribute to Alpaca's rapid growth. If you align with our core values—Stay Curious, Have Empathy, and Be Accountable—and are ready to make a significant impact, we encourage you to apply.
Your Role:
As Head of Business, Crypto Exchanges, you will own the strategy, growth, and operational performance of Alpaca's global crypto exchange business. You'll lead expansion across our B2C and B2B2C offerings, drive licensing, product, and commercial initiatives, and partner cross-functionally to build a scalable, compliant, and market-leading platform. This is a fully remote role with global collaboration across teams and time zones.
Key Responsibilities:
- Exchange entities
- Grow our spot crypto business, including B2C crypto trading and B2B2C Crypto-as-a-Service
- Build and execute license strategies
- Ensure a flawless compliance record
- Oversee audits, both financial and regulatory, while our finance and compliance teams handle the details
- Prospect and decide what new features to add to make our crypto offering competitive
- Add more coins, more chains, more licenses
- Improve the UI/UX for the direct consumer business (Trading API)
- Solution for B2B prospects (Broker API)
- Push internal operational tooling improvements to scale:
- 24/7 global multi-currency banking
- Stablecoin on/off-ramp
- Internal market making
- Crypto reconciliation and rebalancing
- Manage critical contracts with key vendors including Fireblocks, Notabene, and Chainalysis
- Determine better strategies for switching vendors where strategically advantageous
- Design growth initiatives to gain new business
- Get on prospecting calls to pitch new business
- Run solutioning calls to design compliant integrations during presales
- Build out go-to-market materials and training programs to scale this
- Lead and direct initiatives across ops, compliance, finance, sales, and marketing, and support those teams
- Manage upwards by building visibility into business performance via dashboards and AI status reporting
What You Bring (Required Qualifications):
- 5+ years in crypto exchanges, brokerages, or regulated trading venues, with at least 3 years owning a business line rather than a function
- Direct experience with VASP, MSB, or equivalent licensing regimes, including regulatory examinations
- Working knowledge of exchange mechanics: order books, matching, market making, margin systems, liquidations
- Hands-on understanding of crypto operations: custody architecture, hot and cold wallet policy, reconciliation, treasury rebalancing, on-chain settlement
- Experience selling and solutioning B2B infrastructure to institutional counterparties, including technical integration conversations without an engineer present
- Track record managing vendor contracts at commercial scale
- Ability to work across CET and ET time zones daily
- Prior work at a licensed broker-dealer, FCM, or clearing entity
- Familiarity with tokenized securities, stablecoin rails, or on-chain settlement infrastructure
- Experience standing up a licensed entity in a new jurisdiction
- Fluency with Fireblocks, Notabene, Chainalysis, or comparable tooling
- Background in banking operations or payments in a multi-currency environment
- Competitive Salary & Stock Options
- Health Benefits
- New Hire Home-Office Setup: One-time USD $500
- Monthly Stipend: USD $150 per month via a Brex Card
Alpaca is proud to be an equal opportunity workplace dedicated to pursuing and hiring a diverse workforce.
Recruitment Privacy Policy
Similar Jobs
What you need to know about the Chicago Tech Scene
Key Facts About Chicago Tech
- Number of Tech Workers: 245,800; 5.2% of overall workforce (2024 CompTIA survey)
- Major Tech Employers: McDonald’s, John Deere, Boeing, Morningstar
- Key Industries: Artificial intelligence, biotechnology, fintech, software, logistics technology
- Funding Landscape: $2.5 billion in venture capital funding in 2024 (Pitchbook)
- Notable Investors: Pritzker Group Venture Capital, Arch Venture Partners, MATH Venture Partners, Jump Capital, Hyde Park Venture Partners
- Research Centers and Universities: Northwestern University, University of Chicago, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, Illinois Institute of Technology, Argonne National Laboratory, Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory
