Electronic trader Virtu Financial now seemingly pays above $500k per head
Virtu Financial lacks a lot of the mystique of its rivals in electronic trading given that it's a publicly traded company, but that has it's benefits. While reports on pay at firms like Jane Street are unofficial, Virtu files a 10-K annual report with the SEC, breaking down headcount and compensation expense.
The most recent 10k report suggests Virtu is hiring, and becoming an increasingly lucrative place to work.
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Virtu's filing showed that, as of February 13th, it had 1,027 employees, up from 969 that time last year. It had a slight bias towards hiring in Asia, which represented 12% of total headcount, a 1 percentage point increase from last year.
Virtu reported a compensation expense (including payroll taxes) of $528m for the year ending December 31st 2025. It's not clear how many employees Virtu had at that point but, if we use the February headcount figure as an estimate, the firm looks to be paying roughly $514k per head. This is up from $449k in 2024 (last year's report has a similar issue). This looks slightly lacklustre compared to industry leaders Jane Street, which paid staff $1.4m per head in 2024 and seemingly bumped pay up in 2025.
Virtu isn't finished hiring. The report stated that the firm plans to "continue making, significant investments… includ[ing] increases in headcount and other employee-related expenditures." It currently has 31 jobs, including 17 in the US, nine in Europe (primarily Dublin) and five across Hong Kong and Singapore.
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