Blackout Hinders American Stock Exchange

The Northeast blackout caused cooling problems in the computer systems at the American Stock Exchange that prevented it from reopening until 3:45 p.m. Friday, Dow Jones Reports. As a result, Barclays Global Investors – which with 78 exchange-traded funds on the exchange is one of the biggest sponsors of ETFs – saw its trading volume at only one-quarter capacity. With the delay giving the exchange less than one-half hour for trading Friday (the exchange closes at 4:10 p.m.) Barclays was able to achieve even one-quarter its usual trading volume by using alternative trading systems, like electronic crossing networks (ECNs). Forty-eight of Barclays’ ETFs trade on ECNs.

Of the 48 Barclays ETFs that saw some business on Friday, the iShares Dow Jones U.S. Utilities Sector ETF, not surprisingly, saw the biggest volume. Three million shares of this fund traded Friday, compared with the average daily volume of 4.6 million.

__

The staff of Money Management Executive ("MME") has prepared these capsule summaries based on reports published by the news sources to which they are attributed. Those news sources are not associated with MME, and have not prepared, sponsored, endorsed, or approved these summaries.

For reprint and licensing requests for this article, click here.
Money Management Executive
MORE FROM FINANCIAL PLANNING