20000120

KSE to implement new trading system to avert glitches in computers

RECORDER REPORT

KARACHI: The Karachi Stock Exchange (KSE) has decided to implement a new system shortly to avert any glitches in the computer system after holding a mock trading sessions from Jan. 19, 2000.

The KSE in a release said that several investors, traders and media people had got the impression that the Karachi Automated Trading System has been collapsed for the second consecutive day on Tuesday and failed to absorb the work load after a record volume of trading. The factual position was that the market information was interrupted due to the problem in the database part of the existing trading system which only disturbed updating of trades on the market information system and stoppage of on-line index calculation and market summaries. However, the trading through the KATS continued on both days as normal.

It further said that this problem was cropping up due to the heavy trading load on the existing system which was designed to cater for the maximum load of 25,000 trades while the current market trends had led to 50,000 trades per day hitting the daily turnover of over 462 million shares from an average of 128 million in 1999.

The management of the KSE being fully conscious of this situation, has already acquired a new upgraded trading system known as Horizon 3.5 with enhanced capacity to handle 100,000 trades per day and can run on powerful high-end computers.

A presentation on the new system was given to the members of the KSE in a meeting held on Tuesday. The members appreciated the technical problems in the existing system and in order to overcome the existing problems faced by the KATS for updating the database, it was decided that the new upgraded system which was ready should be implemented by the exchange.

The KSE management has accordingly decided to implement the new system shortly after holding mock trading sessions from January 19, 2000 which would help to discover any bug or functionally missing in the new trading system.