Metals Trading Goes Old School During LME’s Electronic Shutdown
- Traders used phones as LMEselect was hit by connection issue
- Problem unrelated to fault shutting London office until August
This article is for subscribers only.
For a few hours this morning, old-fashioned telephone trading saved the world’s biggest metals market from total standstill.
The London Metal Exchange suffered a near four-hour delay to the start of electronic trading on Friday because of a connectivity problem with an external network provider. Brokers had to rely on phones until 4:55 a.m. London time, leaving Asian traders annoyed for missing a chunk of their workday.