U.S. stock exchanges operating normally, issue with FTSE Russell indexes amid global outage

A massive IT outage that is causing unprecedented global disruptions isn’t holding up business as usual in most parts of the financial markets, though one index provider did experience complications.

Officials at both the New York Stock Exchange and the Nasdaq said they are up and running Friday, despite the CrowdStrike problems that have hit everything from airlines to banks to a slew of other businesses around the world.

“NYSE markets are fully operational and we expect a normal open this morning,” a spokesperson for the exchange said Friday.

Similarly, the Nasdaq, which is the favorite trading spot for high-flying tech stocks, said it has managed to make it through the issues caused by an update that CrowdStrike, a global cybersecurity firm, implemented.

“Our European markets and US pre-market are operating normally. We expect our US markets to open normally,” the firm said.

There were other issues, though: Russell US Indexes, which include the closely watched Russell 2000 small-cap gauge, were not calculating after the market open.

“Due to a third party technical issue, we are currently experiencing an impact to our real-time platforms, which is preventing clients from accessing and receiving data,” FTSE Russell said in a statement. “This disruption is affecting FTSE Russell real-time indices. Our dedicated teams are actively investigating the matter to resolve as soon as possible.”

The news also wasn’t good for CrowdStrike itself: Its shares were trading more than 8.5% lower in morning action.

“The failure that occurred is not unique. The scale and the cascading consequences of the failure are what makes this notable,” said Cornell University cybersecurity expert Gregory Falco. “Today is certainly a nightmare of a day for not only all the companies impacted, but global insurance providers who underwrite business continuity.”