Senior Software Engineer · Exchange Infrastructure

Markus Waas

I build the core of an exchange protocol: order matching, derivatives, cross-margin risk, and the security work that keeps it honest.

Read my writing GitHub mail@markuswaas.com
01

About

I own the exchange module at the heart of a derivatives exchange protocol: the Go code that matches spot and derivatives orders and, most recently, cross-margins positions across markets. Around it I have built CosmWasm contracts and Solidity bridges, and I write about smart contract engineering at soliditydeveloper.com.

New Zealand (NZST) · mail@markuswaas.com

Portrait of Markus Waas
Years writing software
0+
Years in distributed systems
0
MSc final grade, CS
0.0
02

Experience

  1. Senior Software Engineer

    Injective Labs

    – Present

    • Own the financial core of the exchange protocol: the Cosmos SDK exchange module's spot and derivatives logic, written in Go.
    • Helped design and build the protocol's new cross-margining system.
    • Drive security across the module: audits, fixes, and continuous hardening of the exchange logic.
    • Earlier work includes Solidity bridge contracts integrated with The Graph, and CosmWasm contracts.

  2. Software Engineer

    Laminar (Acala)

    –

    Designed and built a leveraged margin trading platform on Ethereum with multiple markets, margin calls, and liquidations, plus The Graph integration so the frontend could query state efficiently.

  3. Software Engineer

    Juri

    –

    Implemented a novel staking pool and researched the platform's blockchain integration, most notably designing a fully decentralized oracle system.

  4. Full-stack Software Engineer

    Starbase

    –

    On a small Scrum team building a token-based crowdfunding platform: introduced a staking and ranking smart contract for ERC-20 tokens, implemented a secure funds splitter, and improved the token sale contracts.

  5. Frontend Developer

    Infopark

    –

    Built frontend features for a JavaScript CMS in a Scrum team: new value-type editors and an improved React integration that made the CMS more convenient for developers.

03

Writing

I run soliditydeveloper.com: practical deep dives on smart contract development, from EVM internals to protocol integrations.

How to integrate Wormhole in your smart contracts

Cross-chain messaging across Ethereum, Cosmos and beyond.

How Ethereum scales with Arbitrum Nitro

A blockchain-on-a-blockchain deep dive, and how to use it.

The Ultimate Merkle Tree Guide in Solidity

Everything you need to know about Merkle trees and where they're heading.

Writing ERC-20 Tests in Solidity with Foundry

Blazing-fast tests with no BigNumber.js in sight, only Solidity.

All articles →

04

Education

Humboldt University of Berlin

MSc in Computer Science · Final grade 1.2 (German scale; ≈ 3.9/4.0 GPA)

2011 – 2018

05

Skills

Protocol & chain
GoCosmos SDKCosmWasmRust
Smart contracts
SolidityEVMAudits & hardening
Web
JavaScript / TypeScriptReact
Languages
German (native)English (native proficiency)Spanish (elementary)
06

Interests

Away from the keyboard I train, mostly powerlifting and calisthenics, and play padel and tennis outdoors whenever the summer allows. Beyond sport I go deep on biohacking, longevity research, and Stoic philosophy.

On the technical side I go deep on whatever I'm trying to understand at the moment: consensus and ordering, exchange risk models, and how to prove that a contract does only what it claims.

07

Contact

Building an exchange or a protocol, or want to talk systems engineering?

mail@markuswaas.com