US bonds started trading yesterday after a two-day halt caused by the worst terrorist attack in the country's history. Trading in US stocks will take at least one more day to resume.
Bond firms will be open from 8am to 2pm New York time under a recommendation by the Bond Market Association, an industry group, people familiar with the situation said. The decision followed talks with the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Federal Reserve and the US Treasury, the people said.
Stock markets may resume trading Friday and will open Monday, New York Stock Exchange Chairman Richard Grasso said.
The NYSE and NASDAQ Stock Market, where US$90 billion of shares trade on an average day, met with the SEC, brokerages and New York City officials to decide whether to open. The Big Board and the American Stock Exchange are in an area south of Manhattan's 14th Street that Mayor Rudolph Giuliani closed to civilians.
The SEC and the markets are "doing everything to make it possible" for trading to resume, SEC Chairman Harvey Pitt said.
The Chicago Board of Trade and the Chicago Mercantile Exchange will open tomorrow, except in futures and options contracts linked to stock indexes. The Chicago Board Options Exchange will be closed tomorrow.
Markets closed yesterday, as did many corporate offices, after terrorists hijacked four commercial jets and destroyed both of the World Trade Center's 110-story towers and a nearby 47-story building. The NYSE and NASDAQ never opened yesterday.
US stocks and bonds didn't trade today in Europe. Euronext NV, a combination of the Paris, Brussels and Amsterdam exchanges, said it would resume US stock trading once the Big Board opens.
Deutsche Boerse AG, owner of the Frankfurt exchange, said it would wait until at least Friday.
Treasury securities are poised to rise when bond trading opens. "Shorter-term securities -- up to five-year notes -- will benefit the most,'' said Barry Evans, who oversees US$10 billion at John Hancock Funds in Boston.
Share prices are likely to decline as they did in European, Asian and Latin American markets following the attack, investors said. "Certainly stocks will trade down," said Robert Turner, chief investment officer at Turner Investment Partners, which manages US$10 billion in Berwyn, Pennsylvania.
Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc, based across the street from the site of the World Trade Center, told some people to report to offices in Jersey City, New Jersey. Goldman Sachs Group Inc told some to stay home.
Morgan Stanley Dean Witter & Co told employees to come "on a case-by-case basis," said Judy Hitchen, a company spokeswoman.
Morgan Stanley had 3,500 people working at the Trade Center, and Chairman Philip Purcell said the "vast majority" of them had survived the attack.
Disruptions weren't limited to financial companies. Midway Airlines Corp, a Raleigh, North Carolina-based company operating under bankruptcy protection, shut down and fired 1,700 workers.
Midway said it expected demand for air travel to plunge.
Philip Morris Cos, the largest maker of cigarettes, closed all offices in the New York metropolitan area today after keeping its headquarters in the city open yesterday. General Mills Inc., the maker of cereals such as Cheerios, postponed the scheduled release of fiscal first-quarter results.
On the other hand, Oracle Corp expects to release fiscal first-quarter earnings tomorrow as planned. The third-largest software company lost an employee on a hijacked plane, and others were working in the Trade Center.
"We have to stay on the job," Chief Executive Larry Ellison said. "We cannot let these terrorists shut us down. Not the US, not Oracle."
The last time that US stock trading was suspended for more than one session occurred in March 1933, when President Franklin Delano Roosevelt called for a nationwide bank holiday. The NYSE halted trading for 10 days, according to its Web site. Trading also stopped for more than four months after World War I erupted in 1914, according to the exchange.
European exchanges were open today, and some observed one minute of silence at 8:45am New York time to commemorate the attack's victims.
The FTSE 100 in London gained 2.9 percent, the German DAX rose 1.4 percent and the CAC-40 in Paris added 1.3 percent. Each benchmark index lost at least 5 percent yesterday.
Earlier, Asian stocks tumbled, especially shares of companies most dependent on US sales.
DEFENDING DEMOCRACY: Taiwan shares the same values as those that fought in WWII, and nations must unite to halt the expansion of a new authoritarian bloc, Lai said The government yesterday held a commemoration ceremony for Victory in Europe (V-E) Day, joining the rest of the world for the first time to mark the anniversary of the end of World War II in Europe. Taiwan honoring V-E Day signifies “our growing connections with the international community,” President William Lai (賴清德) said at a reception in Taipei on the 80th anniversary of V-E Day. One of the major lessons of World War II is that “authoritarianism and aggression lead only to slaughter, tragedy and greater inequality,” Lai said. Even more importantly, the war also taught people that “those who cherish peace cannot
STEADFAST FRIEND: The bills encourage increased Taiwan-US engagement and address China’s distortion of UN Resolution 2758 to isolate Taiwan internationally The Presidential Office yesterday thanked the US House of Representatives for unanimously passing two Taiwan-related bills highlighting its solid support for Taiwan’s democracy and global participation, and for deepening bilateral relations. One of the bills, the Taiwan Assurance Implementation Act, requires the US Department of State to periodically review its guidelines for engagement with Taiwan, and report to the US Congress on the guidelines and plans to lift self-imposed limitations on US-Taiwan engagement. The other bill is the Taiwan International Solidarity Act, which clarifies that UN Resolution 2758 does not address the issue of the representation of Taiwan or its people in
Taiwanese Olympic badminton men’s doubles gold medalist Wang Chi-lin (王齊麟) and his new partner, Chiu Hsiang-chieh (邱相榤), clinched the men’s doubles title at the Yonex Taipei Open yesterday, becoming the second Taiwanese team to win a title in the tournament. Ranked 19th in the world, the Taiwanese duo defeated Kang Min-hyuk and Ki Dong-ju of South Korea 21-18, 21-15 in a pulsating 43-minute final to clinch their first doubles title after teaming up last year. Wang, the men’s doubles gold medalist at the 2020 and 2024 Olympics, partnered with Chiu in August last year after the retirement of his teammate Lee Yang
The Philippines yesterday criticized a “high-risk” maneuver by a Chinese vessel near the disputed Scarborough Shoal (Huangyan Island, 黃岩島) in a rare incident involving warships from the two navies. The Scarborough Shoal — a triangular chain of reefs and rocks in the contested South China Sea — has been a flash point between the countries since China seized it from the Philippines in 2012. Taiwan also claims the shoal. Monday’s encounter took place approximately 11.8 nautical miles (22km) southeast” of the Scarborough Shoal, the Philippine military said, during ongoing US-Philippine military exercises that Beijing has criticized as destabilizing. “The Chinese frigate BN 554 was
RSS