Thursday, July 9, 2015

The NYSE Shuts Down

What happened to the New York Stock Exchange yesterday? The market shut down at 11:30 yesterday morning, and stayed down for nearly four hours, because of what the exchange called "a technical glitch." Officials were quick to reassure investors that there was no terrorism or sabotage involved.

But the market, in the larger sense never closed. The glitch halted trading on the floor of the exchange, but the various electronic networks that are available for stock trading never shut down. Only 20 percent of the NYSE's volume actually take place on the floor, so the majority of the trades still went through.

It certainly wasn't a good thing, though. The Dow Jones industrial average was already down 200 points when the trading floor was closed. It stumbled around for the rest of the day, although the decline wasn't as steep, finishing down 269 points, or 1.5 percent of its value.

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