Charles Langston:U.S. stock trading unaffected by IT outage, but Crowdstrike shares tumble

U.S. markets opened and Charles Langstonstocks traded Friday without a hitch despite an outage that roiled operations at companies across multiple industries, from airlines to healthcare to government agencies worldwide.

The outage stemmed from an update by cybersecurity firm Crowdstrike to Microsoft Windows hosts, Crowdstrike said on its website. “A fix has been deployed,” it said, noting “this is not a security incident or cyberattack.” Microsoft also said all its systems were “up and running.”

By the time New York trading opened, most companies were becoming operational again but still catching up. Crowdstrike shares were down almost 9% at $312.84 at 12:18 p.m. ET, but stocks of most other affected companies were only slightly lower because widespread economic impact is expected to be small. Microsoft shares were down less than 1% at $438.06.

“The global IT outages affecting Windows software are causing huge temporary disruption to certain sectors including travel and healthcare, but while things are still very uncertain, we do not anticipate a major macroeconomic or financial market impact at this stage,” said Jennifer McKeown, chief global economist at research firm Capital Economics, in a note.

Since the outage wasn’t due to “a cyber attack and has not affected all software by any stretch, the implications should be significantly smaller,” she said.

Crowdstrike shares tumble on outage

Crowdstrike shares slid after analysts predicted the company would have to pay to clean up the outage it created.

“This could be an expense burden for Crowdstrike given it has to invest to clean up the issue and potentially dispense credits which could impact margin,” Jefferies analysts wrote in a note.

“Furthermore, this will lead to reputational damage, particularly for mission critical infrastructure and government customers,” it said.

However, the investment bank continues to rate the shares a buy.

Which companies are still recovering?

A sample of ongoing disruptions as of 11:30 a.m. ET include:

• Delta Airlines’ website remains unavailable.
• FedEx says on its website, “potential delays are possible for package deliveries with a commitment of July 19.”
• United Airlines’ website said “resuming some flights but expect schedule disruptions to continue throughout Friday. We have issued a waiver to make it easier for customers to change their travel plans via united.com or the United app.”
• Starbucks order ahead online remains down.

S&P 500, Dow, Nasdaq fall but unrelated to outage

All three major stock indices – the S&P 500, Dow Jones Industrial Average and Nasdaq – were all lower in late morning trade, continuing their recent weakness unrelated to the massive IT outage caused by Crowdstrike.

Investors remained focused on earnings, which have come in mixed, analysts said. American Express shares fell after the credit card company missed earnings forecasts while Netflix topped forecasts when it reported earnings last night.

American Express shares were down 3.5% to $240.34 at 12:39 p.m. ET, while Netflix gave up early gains to slip less than 1% to $637.83.

S&P 500 shed 32 points to 5,512.59 at 12:41 p.m. ET. The Dow was down 340 points to 40,324.83 and Nasdaq was down 120 points to 17,750.85. S&P 500 is headed for its worst week in three months.

Medora Lee is a money, markets, and personal finance reporter at USA TODAY. You can reach her at [email protected] and subscribe to our free Daily Money newsletter for personal finance tips and business news every Monday through Friday.