SINGAPORE/LONDON, Nov 28 (Reuters) – Global futures markets were disrupted for several hours on Friday after CME Group, the world’s largest exchange operator, suffered one of its longest outages in years, halting trading across stocks, bonds, commodities and currencies.

By 1335 GMT, trading in foreign exchange, stock and bond futures , , as well as other products had resumed, after having been knocked out for over 11 hours, according to LSEG data.

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The disruption stopped trading in major currency pairs on CME’s EBS platform, as well as benchmark futures for West Texas Intermediate crude , Nasdaq 100 , Nikkei , palm oil and gold , according to LSEG data.

‘A BLACK EYE’

Trading volumes have been thinned out this week by the U.S. Thanksgiving holiday and with dealers looking to close positions for the end of the month, the outage posed a risk of spurring volatility, market participants said.

“It’s a black eye to the CME and probably an overdue reminder of the importance of market structure and how interconnected all these are,” Ben Laidler, head of equity strategy at Bradesco BBI, said.

“We complacently take for granted much of the timing is frankly not great. It’s month end, a lot of things get rebalanced.”

Still, the timing of Friday’s outage, during a shortened U.S. equity trading session with thinner volumes, helped limit its market impact.

“If there was to be a glitch day, today’s probably a good day to have it,” Joe Saluzzi, co-manager of trading at Themis Trading in Chatham, New Jersey, said.

“Beyond the immediate risk of traders being unable to close positions – and the potential costs that follow – the incident raises broader concerns about reliability,” said Axel Rudolph, senior technical analyst at trading platform IG.

A few European brokerages said earlier in the day they had been unable to offer trading in some products on certain futures contracts.

“My anticipation is that life goes on but everybody will have yet another look at their data centre arrangements and invest more in ensuring reliable supply because the importance of data center uptime is higher and higher,” Mikhail Zverev, Portfolio Manager at Amati Global Investors in London.

Regulators are tracking the situation, with both the Commodity Futures Trading Commission and Securities and Exchange Commission confirming they are aware of the issue and conducting ongoing surveillance.

BIGGEST EXCHANGE OPERATOR

CME is the biggest exchange operator by market value and says it offers the widest range of benchmark products, spanning rates, equities, metals, energy, cryptocurrencies and agriculture.

Average daily derivatives volume was 26.3 million contracts in October, CME said earlier this month.

The CME outage on Friday comes more than a decade after the operator had to shut electronic trade for some agricultural contracts in April 2014 due to technical problems, which at the time sent traders back onto the floor.

More recently in 2024 outages at LSEG and Switzerland’s exchange operator briefly interrupted markets.

CME’s own shares were up 0.4% in premarket trading.

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Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy announced that head of the office of the president of Ukraine, Andriy Yermak, had written a letter of resignation.

“I am grateful to Andriy for always presenting the Ukrainian position in the negotiation track exactly as it should be. It has always been a patriotic position,” Zelenskyy noted, according to a translation of his comments in a video.

ZELENSKYY’S TOP AIDE ANDRIY YERMAK FACES CRITICISM AND SOME PRAISE AS WAR WITH RUSSIA DRAGS ON

“But I want there to be no rumors and speculation. As for the new head of the office, tomorrow I will hold consultations with those who can head this institution,” the foreign leader noted.

Yermak’s home had been raided by anti-corruption investigators.

MOMENTUM BUILDS IN UKRAINE PEACE PUSH, BUT EXPERTS FEAR PUTIN WON’T BUDGE

“Today, NABU and SAPO are indeed conducting procedural actions at my home. The investigators have no obstacles. They were given full access to the apartment, my lawyers are on site, interacting with law enforcement officers. From my side, I have full cooperation,” Yermak noted the Ukrainian-language post on Friday.

‘GOLDEN TOILET’ SCANDAL: ZELENSKYY FACES DEEPEST CRISIS YET AS ALLIES ACCUSED IN $100M WARTIME SCHEME

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President Donald Trump’s administration has been aiming to help broker peace between Russia and Ukraine.

Fox News’ Yulia Wallenfang contributed to this report.

Only about one in five tech companies across Europe created between 2020 and 2025 included at least one woman founder, according to the European Commission’s The Gender Investment Gap report.

Even when adjusting for this disparity, companies with female founders also received less investment than firms with male founders.

The highest levels of gender diversity were found in Latvia, at 27%, Italy, at 25.9 %, and Portugal, at 25.2%. These rates represent the proportion of companies with at least one female founder.

In contrast, countries such as the Czech Republic (9%) and Hungary (14.4%) remain well below the European average (19.3%).

Equal participation by women entrepreneurs could increase EU GDP by approximately €600 billion, with countries like Poland seeing growth of 1.6% and the Netherlands up to 5.5% by 2040, according to the 2025 Frontier Economics study.

The gender investment gap refers to systematic disparities between women and men in accessing venture capital and participating in investment decision-making.

Among European small and medium-sized enterprises applying for bank loans, female-owned firms report loan-approval rates about five percentage points lower than male-owned firms. That’s even after controlling for age, size, and sector, according to the European Investment Bank.

Gender disparities also extend to capital ownership and investment behaviour, as data shows women are investing less in retail assets.

Female retail investors currently control about €5.7 trillion in Europe, a figure projected to rise to €9.8 trillion by 2030. If women invested on a parity basis with men, Europe could mobilise an additional €2 to €3 trillion in private investable assets.

“These findings point to an EU-wide economic shortfall well into the hundreds of billions of euros annually – capital that could otherwise be fuelling innovation, employment, green – and digital transitions,” the EC report stated.

What is behind this gender gap?

The gender investment gap has been put down to differences in risk appetite between men and women, as well as societal expectations and financial education.

Historically, entrepreneurship and venture finance have been male-coded domains associated with risk-taking, assertiveness, and individualism.

Decision-making bodies in venture capital and private equity remain male-dominated, reinforcing existing investment patterns.

Societal expectations around women’s caregiving roles and work-life balance continue to influence their access to entrepreneurial networks and capital.

According to the European Commission’s report, even in societies perceived as egalitarian, such as Nordic countries, the assumption that gender equality has already been achieved “can itself act as a barrier – masking ongoing structural biases”.

Across Europe, women also face a “double exclusion” of gender and geography.

European venture capital is mainly based in hubs in London, Paris, Berlin, and Stockholm, which leaves founders in Central, Eastern, and Southern Europe structurally disadvantaged.