Optiver and SIG are the two options market makers that most often end up side by side on a trader applicant's spreadsheet, and this cycle they have split apart. If you are a US undergraduate, Optiver is the open door: its Quantitative Intern (Summer 2027) posting was live again on 20 October and states visa sponsorship, while SIG's US undergraduate trading seats are no longer posted. If you are a Master's or PhD candidate, SIG posts the bigger number ($300,000 base in New York against Optiver's $200,000) and runs the deeper classroom programme.
The 30-second verdict
| Optiver | SIG (Susquehanna) | |
|---|---|---|
| What it is | Market maker founded in Amsterdam in 1986; offices in 11 cities | Quantitative trading firm founded near Philadelphia in 1987; options market making at its core |
| Published results | 2025 net trading income EUR 4.556B (+30%), net profit EUR 1.769B (Optiver, 31 Mar 2026) | None; SIG is private and publishes no results |
| People | 2,233 full-time employees in 2025 (Optiver) | More than 3,000 (Wikipedia, citing SIG) |
| First gate | Short timed modules; 2026/27 invites quote Likelihood-list, Intervals, Orderbooks (Quantt, Sept 2026) | Problem Solving Assessment: about 17 questions in about 60 minutes (Quantt, Sept 2026) |
| Retake rule | One attempt every 8 months, all offices (Optiver postings) | Not stated |
| Posted US graduate base | $200,000 flat (Graduate QR, PhD) | $300,000 (Master's Quantitative Systematic Trader, New York) |
| Posted US intern pay | $70,000-$88,000 base plus sign-on (Quantitative Intern, Chicago) | $8,600 a week for ten weeks (Master's systematic trading intern, New York) |
| Bonus | Global profit-sharing pool | Not published |
| US undergrad trader seat, 20 Oct | Open in Chicago and Austin | Not posted; Dublin and London only |
Optiver is the only one of the two you can size from its own accounts: EUR 4.556B of trading income over 2,233 staff is about EUR 2.0M per person. SIG is private and publishes nothing comparable, so any size comparison beyond headcount is guesswork. Optiver's recent moves point toward Europe: a majority stake in the Leiden power and gas trader Northpool (18 Aug 2026) and market making in autocallable ETFs (5 Oct 2026).
Where the 2027 trader seats are (checked 20 October)
| Firm | Role | Where | Status on 20 Oct 2026 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Optiver | Quantitative Intern (Summer 2027), BS/MS graduating Dec 2027-Jun 2029 | Chicago, Austin | Live; last updated 15 Oct |
| Optiver | Quantitative Trading Internship (2027 start), penultimate year | Amsterdam | Live |
| Optiver | Career Kickstarter: Trading, five days in March 2027 | Amsterdam | Closes 6 Dec 2026, 17:00 CET |
| SIG | Quantitative Trading Internship: Summer 2027 | Dublin, London | Live, rolling |
| SIG | Quantitative Trader - Graduate: 2027 | Dublin, London | Live, rolling |
| SIG | Quantitative Systematic Trading, Master's/PhD (intern and graduate) | New York, Bala Cynwyd | Live |
| SIG | US undergraduate quant trading internship | New York, Bala Cynwyd | Not posted (gone by 9 Oct, per Extern) |
| SIG | Discovery Program: Quant Trading and Strategy Development | New York | Closes 16 Nov 2026 |
Two things in this table matter more than the rest. First, Extern's 9 October recheck reported that Optiver's undergraduate Quantitative Intern posting "has been taken down". By 20 October it was back on Optiver's careers site. Second, SIG's US undergraduate trading internship has not come back. Fortune (10 Jul 2026) put SIG's undergraduate intern pay at about $7,600 a week. For younger students, SIG's New York Discovery Program takes those graduating in winter 2028 or spring 2029 and describes itself as a direct pathway to summer 2028 internships.
Optiver's posting adds a detail that shapes your strategy: interviews decide whether you get a Quant Trading or a Quant Research offer, so you apply once and the firm sorts you.
Interviews: a speed screen vs a reasoning screen
Optiver tests how fast you are before it tests anything else. The test that made its name is 80-in-8: 80 arithmetic questions in eight minutes, no calculator, wrong answers penalised. Quantt's guide (updated 29 Sept 2026) says the 2026/27 invites candidates have quoted do not include it. They list Likelihood-list (rank outcomes by probability), Intervals (give tight confidence intervals) and Orderbooks (find profitable combinations of buys and sells), plus a 25-minute Beat the Odds probability module. After that come a behavioural call with a recruiter, technical interviews on probability, expected value and market-making games, and a final day of senior interviews and trading games played against other candidates. The rule that bites is in the posting itself: one assessment attempt every eight months, at any Optiver office. A rushed attempt in October costs you the cycle.
SIG tests how well you reason. Its Problem Solving Assessment is about 17 free-response questions in about 60 minutes, and Quantt reports that calculators are allowed. Extern's SIG guide (updated Oct 2026) puts the intern version at about 20 minutes. Next comes a recruiter call with "a handful of probability and expected value questions". Then one or two hour-long video interviews with a senior trader, and a final round of expected-value and market-making games with cards, dice and coins, a group bidding game and a 30-minute HR conversation. Candidates report two to eight weeks end to end, most often two to four (Quantt).
| Stage | Optiver (trader track) | SIG (quant trader track) |
|---|---|---|
| Online test | Several short timed modules; 80-in-8 status unconfirmed for 2026/27 | ~17 questions in ~60 min (interns ~20 min) |
| First human | Behavioural call with a recruiter, some light probability | Recruiter call with probability and EV questions |
| Technical | Probability, EV, market-making games | 1-2 x 60 min with a senior trader |
| Final | Senior interviews plus trading games against other candidates | EV games, group bidding game, 30-min HR |
| Retake | Blocked for 8 months, globally | Not stated |
About the poker. SIG's 2027 Dublin and London postings promise "weekly poker classes" in training. That is where the poker lives. Quantt found no recent candidate report of a poker round, and Tradermath says you do not need a poker background to get an offer. Prepare pot odds and bet sizing as expected-value problems, not as poker strategy.
Training, culture and pay
Training is SIG's selling point. Its US internship runs ten weeks: education sessions every afternoon for the first five weeks cover options theory, then morning sessions for the last five run mock trading in a simulated market (SIG campus page). The 2027 London and Dublin postings list classes in finance, options, game theory, tech and poker, and put graduates on a trading desk "within the first few months". Optiver has a dedicated education team too: its Amsterdam internship is ten weeks taught by former traders and researchers, and its graduate postings describe a Global Optiver Academy onboarding before new joiners move into teams. The difference is emphasis. SIG sells the classroom; Optiver sells the desk.
Pay, from what is posted. SIG states a $300,000 base for Master's systematic traders in New York and $8,600 a week for Master's systematic trading interns, plus a signing bonus and housing. Optiver states $200,000 flat for PhD graduate researchers and $70,000-$88,000 for its undergraduate Quantitative Intern, a figure that covers base pay and sign-on together. Neither firm had a US graduate-trader posting with a stated base on 20 October.
Pay, from what people report. Optiver's bonus comes from a global profit-sharing pool, allocated in "marbles", each a share of the firm's PnL (eFinancialCareers, Sept 2025). The same article put Optiver UK's 2024 average pay at GBP 467.6K across an average 133 staff, with GBP 45.6M paid out as profit share. The catch is year one. An Optiver engineer on Blind said in November 2022 that you get no marbles for the first 12 months and that first-year pay is "markedly lower" than at peer firms. In a November 2021 Blind thread, a new-grad trader who had accepted an offer about $200,000 above Optiver's was told that marbles could pay much more later. The same commenter called the system "pretty risky" and the culture "pretty intense". SIG publishes nothing on its bonus (Tradermath). The data points are thin: one Bala Cynwyd quant trader with one to three years reported a $214,000 base and $99,000 more in 2025 (Tradermath). On the technology side, a new grad on Blind in October 2024 held a SIG offer for a front-office developer job in Bala Cynwyd: $170,000 base, $30,000 bonus and $25,000 sign-on. Their worry was that SIG's flat structure would make pay and responsibility grow slowly.
Which should you choose?
- US undergraduate, want to trade in summer 2027: apply to Optiver's Quantitative Intern now, and drill timed arithmetic and probability before you open the test. SIG's US undergraduate trading seat is gone this cycle.
- Graduating in winter 2028 or spring 2029: SIG's New York Discovery Program (closes 16 November) is the earliest posted way into its summer 2028 internships.
- Master's or PhD: SIG's posted $300,000 New York base beats Optiver's $200,000, and both US postings carry a sponsorship line. Ask Optiver how the profit-sharing pool works before you compare totals.
- Studying in Ireland: SIG Dublin's internship needs the right to work in Ireland. Stamp 2 students can work 40 hours a week from June to September (Education in Ireland), which covers a late-June-to-August internship. After graduation, Stamp 1G gives 12 months, extendable by 12 under conditions. The Critical Skills Employment Permit floor is EUR 40,904 from 1 March 2026 (Department of Enterprise), far below the GBP 130,000-180,000 that Quantt estimates for UK and Ireland graduate traders.
- Aiming for Amsterdam: the 30% expat tax ruling drops to 27% from 1 January 2027 for anyone who started using it after 1 January 2024 (business.gov.nl). Budget on 27%.
- Aiming for London: both firms hold A-rated Skilled Worker licences on the 20 October 2026 register. The Graduate visa is two years if you apply by 31 December 2026 and 18 months from 1 January 2027 (GOV.UK).
- Your mental arithmetic is not yet fast: sit SIG's calculator-allowed test first and give Optiver a month of drills. The eight-month lockout makes a weak Optiver attempt expensive.
Prepare for both
- Run the timed arithmetic and market-making format in the Optiver trader mock interview.
- Practise SIG's probability phone screen and EV-game rounds with the SIG quantitative trader mock, which Applr runs as a spoken interview so you practise explaining each expected-value step out loud.
- Read how SIG compares with its closest options peer in Akuna vs SIG, and Optiver against its Amsterdam rival in IMC vs Optiver.
- Track which postings are still open on the New Grad 2027 tracker.
Sources
- Optiver, "Optiver reports robust financial results for 2025", 31 Mar 2026
- Optiver, News & Updates (Northpool stake 18 Aug 2026; autocallable ETFs 5 Oct 2026), retrieved 20 Oct 2026
- Optiver, "Quantitative Intern (Summer 2027)", Chicago, retrieved 20 Oct 2026
- Optiver, "Graduate Quantitative Researcher, PhD (2027 Start)", retrieved 20 Oct 2026
- Optiver, "Quantitative Trading Internship (2027 Start)", Amsterdam, retrieved 20 Oct 2026
- Optiver, "Career Kickstarter - Trading 2027", Amsterdam, retrieved 20 Oct 2026
- SIG, "Quantitative Systematic Trader - Master's: 2027", New York, retrieved 20 Oct 2026
- SIG, "Quantitative Systematic Trading Internship - Master's: Summer 2027", New York, retrieved 20 Oct 2026
- SIG, "Quantitative Trading Internship: Summer 2027", Dublin, retrieved 20 Oct 2026
- SIG, "Quantitative Trader - Graduate: 2027", London, retrieved 20 Oct 2026
- SIG, "Discovery Program: Quantitative Trading and Quantitative Strategy Development", retrieved 20 Oct 2026
- SIG, Campus programs: trading internship, retrieved 20 Oct 2026
- Extern, "Quant Internships Summer 2027: Firms, Pay & Deadlines", checked 9 Oct 2026
- Extern, SIG internship guide, updated Oct 2026
- Fortune, on Susquehanna's $8,600-a-week intern pay, 10 Jul 2026
- Quantt, Optiver interview process guide, updated 29 Sept 2026
- Quantt, SIG interview process guide, updated 29 Sept 2026
- Tradermath, SIG interview guide, Jun 2024
- Tradermath, "SIG (Susquehanna) salary", updated 28 Sept 2026
- eFinancialCareers, Optiver UK pay and profit share, 17 Sept 2025
- Blind, "Optiver vs CitSec/5r/HRT", Nov 2021
- Blind, Optiver SWE comp growth vs other trading firms, Nov 2022
- Blind, SIG vs Palantir new-grad SWE offers, Oct 2024
- Wikipedia, Susquehanna International Group, retrieved 20 Oct 2026
- GOV.UK, Register of licensed sponsors: workers, updated 20 Oct 2026
- GOV.UK, "Graduate visa", retrieved 20 Oct 2026
- Business.gov.nl (RVO), "30 percent ruling compensation down to 27 percent", retrieved 20 Oct 2026
- Department of Enterprise, Tourism and Employment (Ireland), employment permit thresholds, 2 Dec 2025
- Education in Ireland, "Working in Ireland", retrieved 20 Oct 2026
Frequently asked questions
- Is Optiver or SIG harder to get into?
- They filter differently. Optiver's first gate is a set of short, timed online modules; Quantt (updated 29 Sept 2026) reports that 2026/27 invites quote new Likelihood-list, Intervals and Orderbooks modules, and you get one attempt every eight months across all offices. SIG's first gate is a Problem Solving Assessment of about 17 questions in about 60 minutes with a calculator reportedly allowed (Quantt, Sept 2026). If your arithmetic is fast, Optiver's screen suits you; if your edge is careful reasoning, SIG's does.
- Does SIG pay more than Optiver for new grads?
- On posted US base, yes. SIG's Master's Quantitative Systematic Trader posting in New York states a $300,000 annual base, while Optiver's Graduate Quantitative Researcher (PhD) postings in Chicago, New York and Austin state $200,000 (both retrieved 20 Oct 2026). Neither firm publishes bonuses. Optiver pays through a global profit-sharing pool, and an Optiver engineer on Blind said in Nov 2022 that new joiners get no profit-share units for the first 12 months.
- Is SIG's undergraduate quant trading internship still open for summer 2027?
- Not in the US. Extern found SIG's US undergraduate quant trading internship no longer posted on 9 October 2026, and on 20 October SIG's job board listed its Quantitative Trading Internship and Quantitative Trader Graduate roles only in Dublin and London. SIG's US Master's and PhD systematic trading roles were still posted, as was a New York Discovery Program for students graduating in winter 2028 or spring 2029, which closes on 16 November 2026.
- Do Optiver and SIG sponsor visas?
- In the US, the current postings say so. Optiver's Quantitative Intern (Summer 2027) posting says Optiver 'is supportive of US immigration sponsorship for this role', and SIG's Master's Quantitative Systematic Trader posting says 'Visa sponsorship is available for this position' (both retrieved 20 Oct 2026). In the UK, Optiver UK Limited and three Susquehanna entities hold A-rated Skilled Worker licences on the Home Office register dated 20 October 2026. SIG's Dublin internship requires the right to work in Ireland.
- Does SIG interview you with poker?
- Poker is part of SIG's training, not a reliable part of its interview. SIG's 2027 Dublin and London postings list weekly poker classes for interns and graduates. Quantt (Sept 2026) found no recent candidate report of a poker round, and Tradermath says no poker background is needed for an offer. Expect expected-value and market-making games with cards, dice and coins instead.