NYSE and NASDAQ Trading Halts

A trading halt is a temporary pause in trading of a specific equity, or equities, to give all investors (institutional and retail) the opportunity to process specific news that may materially affect the share price. This gives investors time to decide on a course of action. In this case, the stock will typically resume trading about 30 minutes after the issuing company has been released.

Trading halts are also instituted whenever the Securities & Exchange Commission (SEC) determines that there is unusual activity related to a stock’s price. This was the case in January 2021 when shares of GameStop (NYSE: GME), AMC Entertainment (NYSE: AMC), and other stocks were part of a massive short squeeze that threatened the liquidity of the trading platforms to execute the trades.

In rare occasions, United States securities law gives the SEC the authority to suspend trading in any stock for up to ten (10) days. This authority is only exercised when the commission has reason to believe the investing public will be put at risk if the stock continues to trade. For example, if the company has failed to file required documents such as quarterly or annual financial statements.

Specifically, held at open means trading for an exchange or equity occurs before the start of trading. Many companies will wait until after the market closes to issue sensitive information. For example, many companies will release earnings reports after the closing bell.

On the one hand, this gives investors time to digest the information and determine if it is significant. But in an age of 24/7 news coverage and high-speed trading, investors will often set up buy and sell orders to be executed when the market opens. This can lead to a large imbalance between buy and sell orders prior to the market opening.

When this occurs, an exchange may delay the opening of a specific equity until a balance between buy and sell orders is in place.

Trading halts protect investors in two key ways. First, they offer protection against insider trading. One of the most common times that a trading halt is initiated is when news about a company is about to break that is likely to materially affect its share price.

Because no information is actually secret, a trading halt prevents those who have obtained that information legally the opportunity to profit, or mitigate their loss, by preventing trades to be executed before the information is announced to the general public.

A second way trading halts can benefit investors is when the SEC becomes aware that a company is experiencing significant financial difficulty that will ensure it will no longer be a going concern. In this case, a trading halt prevents money to be invested into a company that is destined to fail.

A circuit breaker is a specific mechanism that is used to mitigate extreme buying or selling. It is not the same as a trading halt because it serves a different purpose. In the case of a circuit breaker, an exchange stops trading a particular equity or index if it falls or rises below pre-established levels.

There are currently three levels of circuit breakers, each resulting in specific market action. A circuit breaker will stop trading an entire index (the DJIA, NASDAQ, S&P 500, etc.) if one of the following conditions is met:

Level 1 – a 7% decline from the previous closing price

Level 2 – a 13% decline from the previous closing price

Level 3 - a 20% decline from the previous closing price

If a Level 1 or Level 2 circuit breaker is triggered, the result is an immediate suspension of trading for 15 minutes. An exception occurs after 3:25 p.m. After that time, trading is allowed to continue. If a Level 3 circuit breaker is triggered, trading will be halted for the remainder of the trading day.

Circuit breakers can also kick in on individual equities. In this case the levels/conditions are as follows:

• S&P 500, Russell 1000 or QQQ ETF - a 10% change in value of a security within a 5-minute time frame.
• A 30% change in the value of a security with a price equal or greater to $1 per share.
• A 50% change in the value of a security with a price less than $ 1 per share.

No, when a trading halt is in place, you (or a broker) will not be able to buy or sell any position in the shares.

It is not common for individual stocks to be halted, and it is even less likely for the broader market to be suspended. In fact, the markets have only been halted twice. The first time was on October 27, 2008 during the global financial crisis. At that time the PSE index fell 10.33%. The other occurrence was on March 12, 2020 as a result of uncertainty at the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic.

A trading halt is not, by definition, good or bad. A better way to look at them is to say they are a necessary restriction in a regulated market. They occur due to a major news announcement (which can be good or bad), correcting an order imbalance (which could be bullish or bearish) or because of technical glitches or regulatory concerns. In many cases, a stock will go up after a trading halt.