This Day in Wall Street History 1987: Chicago Board of Trade implements daily price ceilings

With Wall Street still feeling the effects of the record crash of October 1987, futures exchanges scrambled to prevent any more precipitous declines.

On this day in 1987, the Chicago Board of Trade took its own precautionary steps, implementing a daily price ceiling on the Major Market Index future, as well as the Institutional Index future.

Under these limits, the 20 stocks on the Major and Institutional indices were restricted to moves of no more than 40 and 25 points, respectively.

Following the October debacle, Wall Street officials came under fire for failing to reign in and regulate index-futures trading; the move by the Chicago Board was a step toward quieting these claims, as well as holding off potential legislative action by Congress or federal officials.

Source: History.com