On June 3, the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) announced that due to technical issues with the price limit mechanism, more than forty companies, including Berkshire Hathaway, were unable to display their stock prices properly, leading to trading halts. The technical problem has since been resolved, and trading of the affected stocks has resumed.
Earlier on Monday, the NYSE experienced technical glitches causing abnormal display of stock prices, with Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Class A shares showing a 99.97% price drop.
Companies such as Barrick Gold and Nuscale Power were also impacted, with their stock prices plummeting by about 99%, prompting the NYSE to halt trading for these stocks. However, this incident did not have a significant impact on the overall market indices.
According to the latest update from the NYSE, the affected stocks have reopened for trading, with “all systems currently operational.”
The technical malfunction was related to the Consolidated Tape Association (CTA) Security Information Processor (SIP) system. An issue arose while processing price range information, resulting in trading halts for stocks like Berkshire Hathaway Class A shares.
The CTA is an industry organization responsible for disseminating real-time trading and quote data from multiple exchanges.
During the nearly two hours of the malfunction, Berkshire Hathaway Class A shares traded as low as $185.10, a 99.97% loss compared to the normal price. Berkshire Hathaway closed at $627,400 last Friday.
Public data indicates that Berkshire Hathaway’s Class A shares are among the highest-priced stocks in the market.
The NYSE stated that they are reviewing potentially affected trades and will consider canceling trades resulting from the glitch.
The technical issue seems not to have impacted the broader market, as concerns about economic growth led to mostly downward trends in the market.
Apart from Berkshire Hathaway, most halted stocks and exchange-traded funds (ETFs) saw only slight fluctuations in their trading prices.