On 12 March, trading on US stock markets was automatically suspended for 15 minutes. This was due to a built-in trigger being reached. There are several triggers like this built into stock markets around the world. When the markets close like this, third parties like Computershare are unable to execute trades. There may also be further risk of disruption to services depending on the responses of governments, markets, clients and others
If you're a shareholder wanting to trade, please note the following things:
1. Closures like this are not something Computershare or any other third party can control – they're determined by built-in financial triggers.
2. Trades that are placed towards the end of a working day (Monday – Friday) may not be traded until the following working day. Share prices can go up or down from one day to the next so a price you see on one day when you place an order may not be the price available when the trade is placed the following day.
3. Some individual issuers have built-in triggers that cause them to suspend trading of their shares. Again, Computershare has no control over this and will work to enable trading for shareholders as soon as the stocks are open for trading.