Staff Software Engineer

About the role

This role designs and maintains foundational systems for Alpaca's broker-dealer infrastructure, with a focus on enabling the Japan market. The engineer operates as part of a fully remote, globally distributed team. You will own the design, implementation, and long-term health of critical backend services that power high-volume trading workflows for Japanese financial institutions. A significant portion of your work will center on building systems that meet strict regional performance and reliability targets. You will collaborate closely with product and technical leads to turn business requirements into robust, production-grade software solutions. This position requires fluency in Japanese and the ability to navigate local regulatory expectations through clear and precise communication. Ultimately, your contributions will directly support Alpaca's expansion and reliability in the Japanese financial technology landscape.

Key facts

What you'll do

Design and evolve scalable systems that underpin Japan market trading capabilities while meeting demanding performance and reliability standards.

Partner with tech leads to align on architecture through a blend of synchronous discussions and asynchronous communication via Slack and scheduled meetings.

Investigate, diagnose, and resolve production incidents and reported bugs to uphold system integrity and performance across all environments.

Implement and maintain solutions that reliably handle multi-currency transactions within strict financial compliance boundaries.

Apply domain-driven design and event-driven design principles to build resilient and maintainable production systems.

Lead incident response during Japan business hours, taking ownership of diagnosis, communication, and remediation efforts.

Integrate with financial market infrastructure components, ensuring smooth interaction with market data feeds and settlement mechanisms.

Collaborate effectively with global engineering teams, local regulators, vendors, and internal stakeholders to bridge Japanese and English contexts.

Write and maintain clear technical documentation that supports both current operations and future system evolution.

Mentor and influence peers by providing code review feedback that balances technical excellence with pragmatic delivery constraints.

Continuously explore emerging technologies and practices that can enhance the reliability, security, and efficiency of financial workflows.

Translate ambiguous business problems into technical strategies, working independently in a fast-paced, distributed environment.

Ensure that all implemented solutions adhere to accounting principles, ledger structures, and reconciliation requirements for financial systems.

Contribute to the definition and refinement of technical standards, including API contracts, error handling patterns, and monitoring strategies.

Support rapid onboarding and knowledge transfer to ensure continuity across a globally distributed team.

Requirements

The posting states a pay range of $400 to $150.

Japanese fluency at native or JLPT N1 level is mandatory for reading, writing, and communicating with local regulators, vendors, and partners.

Business-level English fluency is required to participate effectively in English-only meetings, design discussions, code reviews, and documentation.

Proven experience in designing and developing complex financial systems is expected, preferably including double-entry accounting.

A solid understanding of accounting principles, ledger structures, and transaction reconciliation is necessary.

Scalable, high-availability financial applications are built to reliably handle multi-currency transactions.

Familiarity with financial market regulations is preferred, with specific Japan experience in FIEA, FSA, JSDA, JIPF, or related frameworks.

Proficiency in at least one statically typed language such as Go, Rust, Java, Kotlin, C#, or Scala is required for designing and efficient architectures.

Background with financial APIs, market data integrations, and trade settlement processes is expected.

Effective collaboration with global teams, local regulators, vendors, and internal stakeholders bridges Japanese and English contexts.

Strong computer science fundamentals and proven software engineering architecture experience are required.

Independent work in a fully remote, globally distributed team is necessary, along with resilience in a fast-paced environment.

Strategic thinking is used to translate technical concepts into business strategies.

Domain-driven design and event-driven design are applied in production systems.

Incident resolution during Japan business hours is led with authority and speed.

Nice to have

Rapid ramping on Go is expected, given that it is Alpaca's primary backend language.

Experience in the Japanese financial services sector with securities firms, banks, brokerages, or fintech is valued.

Hands-on integration with Japan market infrastructure such as JPX, JSCC, JASDEC, or major Japanese banks is preferred.

Familiarity with Japan-specific products such as NISA, iDeCo, tokutei-koza, or MyNumber handling is advantageous.

Startup or fast-growing technology company experience is beneficial.

Understanding of emerging technologies and passion for financial markets are recognized strengths.

Vendor management and organizational budgeting experience is an asset.

Collaboration across multiple time zones with English-speaking teams is expected.

Practical notes

JLPT N1 fluency is mandatory; non-JLPT N1 applicants will not be reviewed.

Good to know

The role focuses on backend systems written in Go within event-driven and distributed architectures.

Engineers work with financial messaging, market data, and settlement workflows in regulated environments.

Domain-driven design and strict reliability practices support high-volume, multi-currency trading.

Cross-regional collaboration relies on asynchronous communication and clear technical documentation.

Production incidents require rapid diagnosis and authoritative resolution during regional business hours.