European Stocks Slammed After “Very Substantial Transaction” Sparks Nordic Markets Flash-Crash

Shortly before 4amET, European stock markets suddenly puked down to last week’s lows with no obvious technical and news-driven catalyst…

The source of the sudden weakness stemmed from the Nordic region where the OMX Stockholm 30 Index slumped as much as 8% in just five minutes before recovering most of the losses shortly after… “It’s most certainly a ‘Nordic Flash Crash’,” said Joakim Bornold, savings economist at Soderberg & Partners

David Augustsson, spokesman for Nasdaq Stockholm, was quick to point out that it wasn’t a technical glitch on their part.

“Our first priority was to exclude technical issues in our systems, and our second priority was to exclude an external attack on our systems. We have now excluded both.”

Notably the flash-crash tested down to early March lows before reversing, strongly suggesting a massive liquidity hole, especially with British markets closed for a bank holiday…

However, instead of admitting the waterfall-like actions of algos that are the usual culprit in these ‘flash-crashes’, Augustsson claims that “It is very clear to us that the cause of this move in the market is a very substantial transaction made by a market participant,” and added that Nasdaq will not cancel any trades made on the Nordic markets.