Continuous trading has moved from concept to operational reality. Global market participants increasingly expect round-the-clock access for price discovery, liquidity management and risk mitigation. The shift mirrors what has already occurred in crypto venues, where systems and participants operate seamlessly without daily shutdowns or fixed windows.

As exchanges evaluate their next phase of technology evolution, the focus has moved to how they deploy 24×7 capability in a resilient, cost-efficient way. These issues were discussed by Magnus Almqvist, CEO of Exberry, and Dan Mcelduff, President of Strategy & Development at Abaxx, in WFE’s recent webinar ‘Always On: Building Infrastructure for 24×7 Exchange Operations’.

The Challenge: Bridging Operational Gaps and Market Expectations

Demand and risk do not follow schedules. Institutional users increasingly require the ability to react to global events at any time, waiting for regional venues to open. In commodity trading particularly, supply and demand factors can emerge at any moment.

End-of-day and start-of-day processes remain major choke points. Most exchanges claiming 24×7 still pause for date-roll, corporate actions and batch calculations, limiting their ability to offer true continuity. Incidents often occur during these transitions, when systems shift between trading sessions.

Clearing and settlement cycles introduce additional constraints. Currency windows, bank availability and regional payment rails make round-the-clock trading difficult without redesign or alternative models. Settlement banks and payment systems must be capable of supporting extended hours. This remains a limiting factor in many regions.

Liquidity distribution is changing. Automated traders use global strategies and can respond to volatility at any moment, making fixed hours feel outdated. Market makers have sufficient technology to be alerted when conditions move outside normal ranges, turning potential disruptions into opportunities. Liquidity will therefore be available when it’s needed most.

Surveillance and monitoring expectations are rising. As trading extends across more hours, regulators expect oversight to keep pace, even when staffing levels are low. Against this backdrop, CTOs must design platforms that support resilience, transparency and regulatory confidence at all hours, without increasing risk or cost exponentially.

Three Pillars for Continuous Operations

To achieve round-the-clock availability, exchanges need a technology model that supports uninterrupted uptime without daily stopping points. Three core design pillars are shaping next-generation platforms.

Modern cloud-native matching engines run continuously. The decision to close becomes purely business or regulatory, never technical. The underlying platform should not dictate trading hours. This architecture allows trades on either side of a cut-off to be assigned to different books without downtime, enabling clearing houses to allocate risk without halting the engine.

Embedded risk controls within the matching engine have become critical for managing volatility without manual intervention. Price collars and circuit breakers ensure the venue cannot empty the book during stressed periods. AI-driven surveillance makes extended hours viable through automated exception detection and real-time monitoring, reducing the need for extensive overnight staffing. Technology reduces manual load, though exchanges must still maintain accountable, senior-level responders for unexpected events.

SaaS models reduce burden and cost. Many venues are shifting to service-delivered matching engines that run always-on environments at scale. This approach enables rapid access to new capabilities, with updates made available every three weeks whilst giving exchanges full control over when updates move into production.

Live upgrades can be executed with near-zero disruption. How? Dual-architecture designs allow one environment to upgrade in parallel whilst traffic shifts seamlessly. This reduces upgrade risks and key-man dependency and allows teams to focus resources on developing their offerings instead of maintaining technology stacks. The result is faster innovation cycles and lower total cost of ownership.

Building for Always-On Markets

As global participation grows and automation deepens, truly round-the-clock capability will become a defining characteristic of modern venues. The move towards 24×7 exchange trading builds on advances already underway across the industry.

The technical barriers once considered insurmountable are now solvable through cloud-native design and SaaS-delivered resilience. For CTOs, this transformation centres on building platforms capable of supporting innovation at any hour whilst reducing risk and giving market participants confidence that their venue is available, orderly and ready for what happens next.

Watch the full WFE webinar for the complete discussion:
https://www.world-exchanges.org/wfe-webinar-always-building-infrastructure-24×7-exchange-operations-option-1