Chicago is one of the world's great centers of derivatives and proprietary trading. It is home to CME Group and Cboe Global Markets and to many trading firms large and small. For family offices in the region, that means an unusually deep pool of talent close to home. Hiring from it well, though, takes an understanding of how these professionals work and what it takes for them to move.
What trading professionals bring
People who have spent years at trading firms tend to share a few valuable habits: disciplined risk management, direct accountability for results, a working knowledge of market structure, and comfort with data and technology. These skills are not limited to traders. Risk managers, operations and treasury specialists, and technologists from trading firms often make excellent family‑office hires, because they have worked under tight controls where mistakes are expensive.
A head start on digital assets
Many of the concepts behind digital‑asset markets — margin, counterparty exposure, 24‑hour trading, and settlement — are familiar to anyone who has worked in derivatives. Both of Chicago's major exchanges listed bitcoin futures in December 2017, and several local trading firms trade digital assets alongside traditional markets. For families with digital‑asset exposure, that makes the city a natural place to find people with experience in both worlds.
Matching the background to the role
Trading backgrounds vary widely. For portfolio roles, discretionary traders, who make judgment calls on positions, often translate more directly to family‑office investing than people from highly automated strategies. For operations, risk, and treasury roles, experience running the controls behind a trading business is often what matters most.
Why the move is not simple
Hiring from a trading firm brings its own challenges:
Compensation: bonuses are often a large share of pay, and part may be deferred and forfeited on leaving.
Restrictions: non‑compete and garden‑leave periods are common, which can push a start date back by months.
Pace and horizon: trading runs on daily and quarterly results; a family office thinks in years and generations.
Structure: moving from a large trading team to a small office working directly with a principal is a real change.
Making it work
The families that hire successfully from trading firms plan for these realities: a realistic timeline that allows for restrictions, an offer built around what the candidate is leaving behind, a clear mandate, and support through the first months as the new leader adjusts to the family's pace. Done well, the result is a leader with rare discipline working on the family's behalf.
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