The Chicago Mercantile Exchange was forced to pull the plug on electronic trading of eurodollar futures for six hours on Monday morning after hitting problems in the roll out of its much-delayed Eagle trading program.
The Chicago exchange halted trading in eurodollar contracts over Globex at 7.15 am (CST), 27 January. The stoppage, which did not affect pit-based trading, came the morning after the CME initiated trading over Project Eagle, a system designed to make it easier to trade complex contracts onscreen.
Initially scheduled for introduction in the summer, Eagle has suffered successive setbacks due to technical problems caused by capacity constraints on the Globex system.
Trading over the system resumed at 1.30 pm (CST). The CME has yet to give a reason for the technical shut-down, but users reported an invesitgation by the Globex Control Centre into order entry failures afflicting the Eagle system.