Friends
Trading at the NYSE was halted today for 3 ½ hours because of a computer glitch, which kept trading volume down in general. The good news is that there are other exchanges to get trades executed so markets continued to trade. The bad news is that sellers seemed to be the only ones interested in trading today. Fueled by continued concern over the collapse in Chinese stock indices, traders were on edge (no one seemed to care when the Chinese market went up 150% in the last year and half, but I digress). At the moment, the Chinese market is down about 40% since June 12th. While the NYSE was out of service because of computer problems, the Chinese have halted more than a third of their stocks voluntarily (can’t go down if you can’t trade it). Needless to say, market participants will be keeping a sharp eye on the proceedings in China.
As for today, by the close the Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 261 points to finish the day at 17,515. The S&P 500 was down 34 points to close at 2046. Gold was up $6 to trade at $1158 per ounce, while oil was down $.55 to trade at $51.78 per barrel WTI.
Yes, with the problems that United Airlines had this morning, and the fact that the Wall Street Journal web site went down the same time the NYSE experienced its glitch, conspiracy/hacking theories were rampant on social media. At the moment, it all appears to be a coincidence, but…
The Fed minutes released today (somewhat forgotten in the craziness) were interpreted to be somewhat dovish which resulted in a little rally in the 10 year Treasury note which finished trading at 2.21%. Earnings season begins after the close with the release of Alcoa’s earnings, so we can add that to the angst created by Greece and China. Let’s see how traders deal with it all tomorrow.
Have a nice evening everyone.
