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Dow Jones Plunge Fueled by Overwhelmed Computers
cloudscout writes "The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped over 400 points today. While there were various valid financial reasons for such a decline, some of the blame is being placed on computer systems that couldn't keep up with the abnormally high volume at the New York Stock Exchange and the resulting tremor as they switched over to a backup system."
As well as crashing planes into buildings, it seems "Debt of Honor" is getting good at being an oracle of modern times.
Donte Alistair Anderson Roberts - hi son!
Karma: Chameleon
Change in Chineese trading market regulations were the cause of this drop. A massive sell off occurred with the beginning of a crackdown on questionable and illegal trading on China's stock market. This rippled to every other market in the world. Asian, North America, South American and European markets were all affected. Blaming the computer systems is damage control.
The cancel button is your friend. Do not hesitate to use it.
as someone who has worked on the floor and systems at NYSE, I can assure you that none of the machines used for trading by specialists or brokers are windows machines, nor are the backends.
all of the machines you see in pictures are dumb terminals connected to a number of master unix systems. they are configured for that special keyboard set used for deals and also touchscreen inputs. however, some (not all) can be booted into windows for personal use or to use firm-specific software.
a side note -- the monitors used by NYSE (you can see them in the pictures on CNN) are ridiculous. huge size, almost perfect 180 degree visibility from side to side and top to bottom, touchscreen, and dust/fingerprint repellent. pretty nasty stuff.
as far as the backends go, the standard system and the backup system are kept running in two locations -- on site, and in a backup location outside of manhattan (not to hard to figure out where, if you try). one can function without the other, on both counts. The QA done to ensure validity is INSANE. Nothing can even be brought out on to the floor without making sure it won't corrupt any of the systems (including the bluetooth system that has become the lifeline of the trading floor -- largest (in size and traffic) private bluetooth network in the world, when I was working the floor)