Seeing the Whole Market: Why Data Resilience Matters When Trading Overnight
January 29, 2026 - Chicago, IL
Most people never think about redundancy – until it’s missing.
Airports, telecommunications networks and payment systems aren’t designed around a single point of failure. They’re built to remain functional even when something breaks, because when these essential utilities break down, the impact is widespread, trust-eroding and incredibly costly.
Over the past year, overnight equity markets have reached a similar threshold. What was once a lightly used extension of the trading day is now a global, customer-facing market with meaningful participation and real expectations around continuity, transparency and trust. As overnight trading matures, the infrastructure that supports it – including market data – needs to mature as well.
Market Data Risk in an Always-On Market
In U.S. equities, regulators have long required redundancy across core elements of market structure. Venues, brokers and other critical systems are expected to maintain backup capabilities so that a single failure doesn’t bring activity to a halt. Market data sits somewhat outside that framework – yet the risk of failure is just as significant.
If a firm consumes market data from only one overnight venue and that venue experiences a system issue or outage, there is a real possibility that no data will be available to display during that period. That disruption could last a minute, an hour or an entire overnight trading session. All the while, customers may have limited or no visibility into prices, quotes or recent trading activity.
Relying on a single venue for data might not land you in the regulatory crosshairs, but it certainly puts the customer experience at risk. It’s up to each firm to decide what level of resilience they are comfortable providing their customers in this increasingly competitive landscape.
Market Visibility Is Venue-Specific
When people think about risk, they often picture a system going fully dark. In practice, some of the most disruptive failures are quieter.
In overnight markets, relying on a single source of data can create blind spots even when systems are technically “up.” That’s because alternative trading systems (ATSs) operate with venue-specific rules and thresholds that directly affect what data is available at any given time. For example, a particular venue may halt certain symbols during the overnight session based on regulatory thresholds related to their total executed volume in each halted symbol as compared to the overall U.S. market. These are voluntary halts by the venue, not corporate-action halts, and they occur in symbols that have been particularly active overnight.
At the same time, those same symbols may continue trading on other venues, including Bruce ATS. In this instance, quotes and last-sale data for those symbols remain available to firms consuming Bruce ATS market data feeds. Those that rely on a single provider may be left in the dark.
This is an illustrative example, not a criticism of how any one venue operates. Different venues make different choices based on their regulatory frameworks, operational models and strategic priorities. The issue is simply that no single overnight data feed can fully represent the entire market in all conditions.
Either way, the potential for confusion among retail brokers and their customers is significant. Trading may still be possible, but prices and last-sale data are not – often in the precise names that are seeing heightened overnight activity. Uncertainty and missed opportunities follow. From there, it doesn’t take long for mistrust to set in.
The Next Phase of Overnight Trading: Resilience by Design
In mature market structures, resilience is treated as a design principle, not a workaround. Multiple venues, multiple liquidity providers and multiple points of access create healthier markets by reducing single points of failure and improving overall transparency and reliability.
The same logic increasingly applies to overnight market data.
It’s worth being candid: some firms are still treating overnight data as an afterthought. They rely on a single venue, accept partial visibility and treat limited coverage as an acceptable constraint in a relatively young market rather than a solvable design problem. In an always-on market, that mindset falls short. When investors are active overnight, incomplete data represents a real gap in service, and one that firms should not be comfortable defending.
As Bruce ATS has grown and taken market share, its data has become more representative of overnight price discovery. In many cases, Bruce ATS now contributes the best quote or unique liquidity during the overnight session. In that environment, relying on a single source of displayed data becomes less consistent and less reliable for retail clients over time, particularly as activity concentrates in specific symbols.
Adding an additional overnight data feed is therefore not about assuming failure. It is about designing for resilience – ensuring brokers and their customers retain visibility into the market across a broader range of conditions, including periods of heightened activity or venue-specific constraints.
Of course, it’s reasonable to expect continued evolution in exchange-led and consolidated data initiatives over time. But overnight markets are no longer experimental: they are active, global and increasingly important to retail investors. Firms need to deliver reliable market visibility today, not just at some future milestone. As the momentum continues, the infrastructure supporting overnight trading should reflect the same principles that govern daytime markets, including transparency and thoughtful market design.
Market data may not yet be regulated as critical infrastructure, but functionally, it already plays that role. Treating it accordingly is simply the logical next step.
About Bruce ATS™
Bruce ATS™, operated by SEC and FINRA-registered broker-dealer Bruce Markets™, is an Alternative Trading System offering secure overnight access to U.S. markets. Bruce ATS™ provides financial institutions with seamless integration and scalable solutions. Designed for reliability and performance at enterprise scale, Bruce ATS™ redefines after-hours trading by bridging the gap between investors and U.S. markets, empowering firms to extend trading opportunities beyond traditional hours with confidence and ease. For more information, visit www.brucemarkets.com.