Some Merrill clients reported technical issues that prevented them from making trades Wednesday on the firm's website and app, including online brokerage Merrill Edge, according to social media posts.
The company attributed the interruption to planned platform enhancements and noted the issue has been resolved.
Outage monitoring site Downdetector indicated as many as 120 problem reports around 11:15 a.m. Eastern Daylight Time, with the numbers then waning.
"I tried all morning to sell shares of a stock and got error messages. It happened again around 12:30 with a different stock. I can view my holdings as normal. I gave up after being on hold for 18 minutes," one Downdetector user posted mid-afternoon.
"Can't buy sell any stocks using Merrill Lynch APP or website. It gives me an Error," another posted.
On X, a user posted what appear to be screenshots of a Merrill customer service conversation, in which the client complained they lost money by their inability to trade.
A spokesperson for Merrill parent Bank of America told ThinkAdvisor in an email later Wednesday, "We made planned enhancements to our online and mobile app platforms causing some clients to experience a brief service interruption. The issue has been resolved. We apologize for any inconvenience."
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