CME Outage: A Wake-up Call for Data Center Reliability

CME Group, the world's largest exchange operator, faced a major disruption due to a data centre cooling issue, causing a halt in trading for over 11 hours. The event highlighted the importance of reliable data centre infrastructure and the growing necessity for investing in data center uptime.

CME Group, the largest global exchange operator, experienced one of its lengthiest disruptions in years on Friday, sparking chaos across various markets. A data centre cooling problem led to an 11-hour suspension of trading activities involving stocks, bonds, commodities, and currencies before systems were restored at 1335 GMT, according to LSEG data.

Industry voices, including Mikhail Zverev from Amati Global Investors and Karl Schamotta of Corpay, emphasized the necessity of robust data centre infrastructure amid increasing reliance on technology. Currency markets showed resilience during the outage, and experts noted that the incident coincided with low market liquidity due to the Thanksgiving holiday.

Joe Saluzzi of Themis Trading and Alex Morris from F/M Investments remarked on the timing of the outage, pointing out its limited impact on trading volumes given the half-day market schedule. The outage serves as a reminder of the critical role data centres play in global trading operations.

(With inputs from agencies.)