Tokyo bourse halts all trade (stock exchange closing early)

Reuters ^ | 1/17/05

[carl in alaska]

TOKYO (Reuters) - The Tokyo Stock Exchange said on Wednesday it would halt all trade at 2:40 p.m. (0540 GMT) as the number of trades was nearing the bourse's system capacity limit.

[carl in alaska]

Very unusual event. There must be a large number of investors selling stock. The Japanese stock market has had a big rally in recent months, so most likely this is normal profit-taking. Still, a very odd occurence.

[MinorityRepublican]

Huh? There's nothing going on.

[carl in alaska]

Story just says it's a system capacity limit problem. I suppose that could be all that's happening here.

[carl in alaska]

New story just out at 1:15 est says they had a "stampede of sell orders." I don't think it's a panic; more likely this is the kind of thing that online trading can cause because people can react to the market so quickly now.

[Moonman62]

Apparently a scandal at one of their internet companies is causing the selling. There are other posts on FR about it.

[carl in alaska]

Yeah that's right. I'm tired tonight and I forgot I just read about that...investigation of Livedoor Co.

[LibertarianInExile]

The other angle floated is that Yahoo and Intel earnings came in low and prompted selloffs.

The capacity thing is evidently a max cap on trades, not prices. So the Nikkei could tank, but only if some really big trades dropped it.

[carl in alaska]

I think it's that stuff plus high oil prices caused by problems in Iran and Nigeria. Plus the Japanese market went up too far too fast.....(I will not belabor the obvious any more...lol)

[Moonman62]

Didn't Soros put a fortune into Intel a couple of months ago? What a pity if he did.

[M. Espinola]

TOKYO (AFX) - Share prices extended their nosedive today before the stock exchange halted all trading early for the first time in 57 years, amid the fallout from Monday's raid by prosecutors on the offices of Internet company Livedoor Co.

The exchange announced that it stopped accepting any new orders on all listed shares and convertible bonds at 2.40 pm (0540 GMT) here, 20 minutes before the scheduled close at 3.00 pm, to avoid any trading system failure in view of the surging trading volume.

When trading finished for the day, the blue-chip Nikkei 225 stock had dropped 464.77 points or 2.9 pct to 15,341.18, after touching a low of 15,059.52.

The broader TOPIX index of all First Section shares tumbled 59.94 points or 3.5 pct, to end at 1,574.67, after touching a low of 1,538.85.

Losers overwhelmed gainers 1,574 to 83, with just 11 issues unchanged.

Volume rose to 3.28 bln shares from 2.46 bln yesterday.

Link

[LibertarianInExile]

"Didn't Soros put a fortune into Intel a couple of months ago? What a pity if he did."

One can only hope, and one can also hope he loses his shirt. Of course, if he does, I would probably be forced to cry myself to sleep at night, if only because of all the nutjobs who tell me I'm some sort of Soros-funded flunky when I don't agree with them. 8)

[Moonman62]

EBAY and AAPL also disapointed with their outlooks today. Two other stocks Soros just bought. I'm so sad.

[LibertarianInExile]

"EBAY and AAPL also disapointed with their outlooks today. Two other stocks Soros just bought. I'm so sad."

[tears reflexively squirting from eyes]

8)

[Busywhiskers]

Just another unrelated incident...