Lead Java Developer

ICE Clear Credit, Inc. (ICC), a subsidiary of Intercontinental Exchange, Inc., is seeking a Lead Software Developer to drive the design and development of FIX-based API for post-trade systems supporting the global Credit Default Swaps (CDS) marketplace.

ICC operates the world's largest systemically important CDS clearinghouse, delivering highly available, low-latency, and regulation-critical infrastructure for financial markets. This role is focused on hands-on leadership: owning FIX connectivity, building and operating resilient distributed services, and leading delivery for mission-critical post-trade workflows in Fixed Income markets.

The Lead Developer is expected to make an immediate impact in production, act as a technical lead for FIX API services (both protocol and functional aspects), and collaborate closely with business, technology, and infrastructure teams in a fast-moving environment.

Responsibilities

• Act as technical lead for FIX-based API for post-trade services across allocation, confirmation, and swaps / fixed income clearing workflows. This is a 100% hands on design and development role.

• Design, build, and maintain high-performance Java services supporting real-time trade processing

• Lead FIX 4.4 and FIX 5.x implementations, including session management, message validation, and flow orchestration

• Design and implement FIX clustering and HA strategies ensuring fault tolerance and operational resiliency

• Own production stability, performance tuning, and operational readiness of FIX services

• Collaborate with internal teams and external counterparties to deliver FIX integrations end-to-end

• Translate business and regulatory requirements into robust technical solutions

• Provide technical leadership through design ownership, code reviews, and mentoring

• Participate actively in the full SDLC, from requirements and design through release and support

• Bachelor's degree in computer science, Engineering, MIS, or equivalent experience

• 5+ years of professional software development experience in Java

• 3+ years of hands-on experience working with FIX protocol (4.4 and/or 5.x) in production systems

• Demonstrated experience leading delivery of complex backend services in fast-paced, regulated environments

• Strong analytical, problem-solving, and communication skills

• Ability to lead technically while remaining highly hands-on

• Strong expertise in Java, including concurrency, memory management, and performance tuning

• Extensive experience with FIX protocol design and implementation, particularly for post-trade workflows

• Hands-on development using Spring, JPA/Hibernate, and modern Java frameworks

• Experience building low-latency, distributed systems

• Solid database experience (SQL, PL/SQL, views, performance tuning)

• Experience with microservice and SOA architectures

• Familiarity with messaging and integration technologies including:

• JMS

• Kafka

• REST

• Web Sockets

• Redis

• Experience working in Agile development environments

• Strong understanding of operational considerations (monitoring, logging, failover, recovery)

Preferred Knowledge and Experience

• 2+ years of experience in financial markets technology (bank, hedge fund, or proprietary trading firm)

• Hands-on experience with QuickFIX/J, including configuration, session lifecycle, and clustering

• Strong understanding of the Fixed Income post-trade lifecycle (allocations, confirmations, clearing)

• Experience deploying services to containerized Kubernetes platforms (OpenShift, Tanzu, etc.)

• Experience with resiliency patterns such as active-active deployments, load balancing, and failover

• Exposure to performance and load testing methodologies

• Experience collaborating with UI teams or modern UI technologies (React, Angular)

• Knowledge and practical experience with AI-assisted development tools such as GitHub Copilot, Claude, Cursor, or similar platforms.