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A technical glitch halted all securities trading for three hours on Thursday at the New York-based Nasdaq exchange where shares in major US companies including Facebook, Intel and Apple are traded.
Nasdaq, the second largest stock exchange in the US, was down due to a computer malfunction that disrupted the dissemination of up-to-date quotes and prices, according to Bloomberg.
“The real fear is that we get stuck wearing some kind of risk because of an interruption that is not of our doing,” Max Breier, a senior equity derivatives trader at BMO Capital Markets Corp told Bloomberg.
“Any halt in information or ability to trade is going to hinder our ability to manage our risk and take positions.”
The disruption was considered serious enough that US President Barack Obama was briefed on the situation by White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough.
After resuming the trade of small-volume stocks as a test, the exchange recovered around 3:25 pm (1925 GMT), just 30 minutes before the closing bell.
Despite the disruption, the Nasdaq Composite index added 1 per cent during the day to close at 3638 points.
Amid increasing mistrust of electronic trading on the market, Thursday’s glitch came just two days after a technical error mistakenly recorded trades by Goldman Sachs.
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