---
title: 'Head of Finance at Smarkets'
canonical: 'https://feeny.ai/job/head-of-finance-smarkets-chicago-gq3ht7rxr85e'
type: 'job'
last_seen: '2026-09-09'
---

# Head of Finance at Smarkets

- **Company:** Smarkets
- **Location:** Chicago, IL
- **Employment:** full-time
- **Posted:** 2026-08-11
- **Last confirmed live:** 2026-09-09
- **Apply:** https://jobs.ashbyhq.com/smarkets/d46d50a8-7ad7-4291-adab-b8cdf5d57f82

## Job description

CFTC-Regulated Business Unit (DCO and DCM) Location: Chicago, IL. Fully remote to start, transitioning to 3 days/week in office.

## About Smarkets

Smarkets is a prediction market exchange for sports and political trading that has handled over $50 billion in volume since 2010. We are upending the sports betting industry by growing a platform that offers the best value for traders, with not only the fairest prices but also the best technology, alongside a superior customer experience.

We believe the foundation to our success is attracting the best people to our organisation and creating a high-performance environment where they can thrive. We are searching for an atypical candidate with a wealth of regulated business experience to support the development of our CFTC business.

## The Role

This is a senior finance role sitting within our CFTC-regulated business unit, working across the Derivatives Clearing Organization (DCO) and Designated Contract Market (DCM). You will own budgeting, liquidity planning, financial controls, and capital adequacy, ensuring the DCM and DCO meet all Part 39 and Part 38 requirements. As the business will be only offering fully collateralized trades, margin requirements are not expected to be a material part of the role. This is a founding build: our licensing applications are in-flight and you will stand up the finance function and controls through to go-live, then operate and scale them as the business grows. Given the business unit's integration with a UK-based parent, you will also ensure accurate cost allocation, intercompany accounting, and resource tracking across jurisdictions while preserving regulatory independence.

## About You

- Senior finance leader with 5+ years of senior-level financial management experience, ideally within a CFTC-regulated business.
- Certified Public Accountant (CPA) in good standing with a U.S. State Board of Accountancy.
- Deep expertise in US GAAP, financial forecasting, and internal financial controls.
- Familiarity with DCO and DCM financial compliance obligations.
- Demonstrated ability to maintain regulatory financial-resources adequacy, including operating-cost coverage, resource liquidity, and financial forecasting.
- A clean regulatory record, with no history of financial misconduct, enforcement actions, or regulatory infractions.
- Excellent reporting and communication skills for executive, board, and regulatory audiences.

## Responsibilities

- Own all financial operations of the DCO and DCM entities, including budgeting, accounting, financial reporting, and liquidity management.
- Ensure the DCO and DCM maintain sufficient financial resources to satisfy capital adequacy and operating cost coverage.
- Support and manage the delivery of quarterly financial statements and annual audited accounts.
- Maintain internal controls and accounting systems that support the integrity and auditability of financial records.
- Lead financial forecasting, stress testing, and capital planning, aligned with the DCO and DCM's risk profile and operational footprint.
- Prepare and submit timely, accurate regulatory financial filings to the CFTC and support audits and inquiries.
- Coordinate with external auditors, legal counsel, and regulators to ensure full financial compliance.
- Partner closely with the COO, General Counsel, and Risk teams to assess financial risk and resource implications.
- Track and allocate financial resources across the US entity and the UK-based parent where shared services exist, preserving regulatory independence.
- Provide executive-level financial insight to the board or governing body of the DCM.

Desirable Attributes

- Personal interest in sports, exchanges, or trading
- Experience in exchange, clearing, or other market infrastructure finance.
- Familiarity with event contracts, prediction markets, or similar novel futures products.
- Experience operating across US and UK finance and tax environments.

## Our Values

- Push to win
- Make others better
- Give a shit
- Be a pro
- Bring the energy

Our values are at the heart of everything that we do. We believe these are the fundamentals to ensure we are delivering what's expected of us in the best way possible for ourselves and for those around us.

## Compensation and Benefits

Base salary range: $100,000 to $170,000 USD per year. The actual offer within this range will depend on experience, qualifications, and other job-related factors.

We have designed our benefits offering around Health, Wealth, Lifestyle and Development. From day one, you will receive:

- 25 days' annual leave, plus public holidays.
- 401(k) plan: Smarkets matches 100% of employee contributions up to the first 6% of salary. Participation is voluntary, with automatic enrolment at a default contribution rate of 6% unless you select an alternative rate or choose to opt out.
- Private medical insurance: a monthly reimbursement towards the private health insurance plan of your choice.
- Performance bonus of up to 25% of base salary.
- Equity via share options scheme.
- Annual professional development budget of $1,000 for conferences, training, courses, books, and other learning opportunities.
- Work From Anywhere: up to 20 days per year (pro-rated) to work remotely from locations around the world.

Additional Information

- This role is offered subject to satisfactory background screening and, where applicable, CFTC fitness and eligibility requirements.
- We use Ashby, our applicant tracking system, to manage applications, and AI-assisted tools may be used to support parts of our recruitment process. Applications are reviewed by our team, and hiring decisions are made by people rather than by automated tools.

## About Smarkets

## Company Overview
- **One-liner**: Smarkets operates a peer-to-peer betting exchange and prediction market platform that allows users to back and lay outcomes on sports, politics, and current events with low commission and sharp pricing.
- **Entity Type**: Private (multiple funding rounds including Series B)
- **Headquarters**: London, United Kingdom
- **Founded**: 2008
- **Founders**: Jason Trost (CEO), Hunter Morris, Donald Trost

## Core Business
- Primary industries: Financial Services, Betting & Prediction Markets, Exchange Technology
- Target customers: B2C (retail traders and bettors) and B2B (institutional market makers, algorithmic traders via API)
- Mission or purpose: "To revolutionise the betting industry by building a more fair, customer-focused betting experience" and "to build the infrastructure for how the world prices uncertain events."

## Products & Services
- **Smarkets Exchange**: A peer-to-peer betting exchange where users bet against each other rather than a bookmaker. Charges a default 2% commission on net winnings only (no commission on losses). Covers sports, politics, current affairs, and entertainment. Offers a full REST/Streaming API for algorithmic traders.
- **SBK Sportsbook App**: A sportsbook product launched in 2022 that provides a traditional fixed-odds betting experience alongside the exchange model.
- **Prediction Market Infrastructure**: The underlying platform processes billions in annual volume and is built on a modern tech stack (Linux, Kafka, Postgres, Kubernetes) with performance-critical systems in Rust and C++.

## Market Standing
- **Valuation**: Not publicly disclosed
- **Key Metrics**: 
  - Annual Revenue: GBP 11.9 million (source: LeadIQ)
  - Total Funding: Conflicting reports – LeadIQ states USD 3.7 million (over 5 rounds), while Wellfound states USD 33.7 million (Series B led by Susquehanna Growth Equity in 2021). 
  - Lifetime matched volume: Over £20 billion (source: pm.wiki)
- **Notable Investors/Partners**: Passion Capital (seed), Susquehanna Growth Equity (Series B), SailGP (three-year sports trading partnership)
- **Growth Signals**: 
  - Headcount grew 20.2% YoY (76 employees per LeadIQ, but firm claims 100+ team)
  - Actively pursuing a US CFTC Designated Contract Markets license to enter American prediction markets (announced March 2026)
  - Operates in 6 countries (UK, Malta, US, Costa Rica, Brazil, Portugal)
  - 1M+ customers worldwide

## Competitive Advantages
- **Low commission model**: 2% on net winnings only – significantly lower than rivals like Betfair (5–7%).
- **Proprietary market-making technology**: Consistently delivers sharper prices through deep liquidity and proprietary algorithms.
- **Modern tech stack**: Built on Linux, Kafka, Postgres, Kubernetes, with performance-critical components in Rust and C++20, and product surfaces in Python and React.
- **Longevity and resilience**: Founded in 2008, has survived multiple market cycles and competitors.

## Strategic Focus
- **US expansion**: Filing for CFTC license to enter the regulated US prediction market space.
- **Infrastructure for truth discovery**: Positioning itself as the infrastructure for pricing uncertain events across sports, politics, and emerging markets.
- **Continuous platform improvement**: Enhancing scalability, performance, and usability for both retail and algorithmic traders.

## Why Work Here
- **Culture highlights**: "Intelligent, diverse individuals committed to making things better" – strong engineering culture with high autonomy for teams.
- **Remote/Hybrid policy**: Hybrid with a London HQ and Malta office; some roles listed as remote on Wellfound.
- **Notable perks**:
  - In-house chefs providing fresh, sustainable meals daily (rooftop kitchen, "lunch al fresco" encouraged)
  - Annual training budget of £1,000 per employee
  - Private health insurance (comprehensive)
  - Up to 6% pension match
  - Stock options
  - Enhanced parental leave
  - Cycle-to-work scheme
- **Engineering culture**: "High-performing teams that have control over the features they ship and the code they write" – modern tech stack and active hiring for senior engineers.

## Sources
1. [smarkets.com/careers](https://smarkets.com/careers/)
2. [linkedin.com/company/smarkets](https://uk.linkedin.com/company/smarkets)
3. [wellfound.com/company/smarkets](https://wellfound.com/company/smarkets)
4. [leadiq.com/c/smarkets](https://leadiq.com/c/smarkets/5a1d9348540000540077bdc2)
5. [pm.wiki/projects/smarkets](https://pm.wiki/projects/smarkets)

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