DOW screwed up by an erroneous trade !!!

Written by Reuters, The Edge Malaysia.

'SCREWED UP'

Earlier, sources told Reuters that the plunge in the Dow Jones Industrial average may have been caused by an erroneous trade entered by a person at a big Wall Street bank.

Market sources said the erroneous trade may have involved E-Mini contracts -- stock market index futures contracts that trade on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange's Globex trading platform. The composition of the E-Mini is similar to the stocks in the S&P 500.

"I can confirm that our markets operated properly and there were no problems," a CME Group spokesman said.

Other market sources said the erroneous trading involved the IWD exchange-traded fund or the S&P 500 Mini. A person close to BlackRock, which manages the IWD, said there was no unusual trading in the iShares product.

During the sell-off, Procter & Gamble shares plummeted nearly 37 percent to $39.37 at 2:47 p.m. ET (1847 GMT), prompting the company to investigate whether any erroneous trades had occurred. The shares are listed on the New York Stock Exchange, but the significantly lower share price was recorded on a different electronic trading venue.

"We don't know what caused it," said Procter & Gamble spokeswoman Jennifer Chelune. "We know that that was an electronic trade ... and we're looking into it with Nasdaq and the other major electronic exchanges."

A different P&G spokesman had said earlier the company contacted the Securities and Exchange Commission, but Chelune said that he spoke in error.

One NYSE employee leaving the Big Board's headquarters in lower Manhattan said the P&G share plunge lay at the center of whatever happened.

"I'll give you a tip," the employee said, speaking on condition of anonymity. "P&G. Check out the low sale of the day. Something screwed up with the system. It traded down $30 at one point."

WIDE SWINGS

Nasdaq said it was working with other major markets to review the market activity that occurred between 2:00 p.m. and 3:00 p.m., when the market plunge happened.

The exchange later said it was investigating potentially erroneous transactions involving multiple securities executed between 2:40 and 3:00 p.m.

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