Microsoft outage forces global traders to phones as settlements delayed

Microsoft's outage disrupted global financial markets Friday, forcing traders to abandon Outlook and Teams for phones, WhatsApp and fax, delaying trade confirmations and settlements. The disruption affected UBS, CMC Markets and BNP Paribas, with traders reporting backed-up confirmations and settlement headaches. Japan's finance ministry lost email access, Workhorse Group postponed earnings, and some Indian brokerages warned clients of delayed responses. Microsoft received about 200,000 outage reports, among its most severe, with shares down 0.4% in extended trading. The company said it's seeing positive results restarting affected infrastructure, though some fixes haven't worked as expected.