Josh Levine invented the technology behind the Nasdaq OMX Group Inc.'s exchanges system. He said that stock markets needed to be designed properly to avoid single points of failure. However, a design that would avoid a single points failure had been deemed difficult to achieved, he added.
Yesterday, the Nasdaq Stock Market ceased trading in listed shares for three hours. This was after the connectivity was interrupted between its data processor and the NYSE Arca. The latter is where around 11% of American share volume occurs. The system breakdown led Nasdaq to freeze thousands of stocks including those that are from Facebook Inc. and Apple Inc. Both companies traded on approximately 50 markets.
The system breakdown from yesterday led traders to question if the problems in Nasdaq's quote distributing unit were enough to leave half of the American equity market stagnant. Nasdaq Chief Executive Officer Robert Greifield said on Blommberg TV this morning that bad data raised investor concerns as it could lead to information asymmetry.
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