Service Availability

Service Availability is a measure of the percentage of time that a system is operational and accessible to users. In the financial sector, where every second of downtime can result in significant losses, high service availability is a non-negotiable requirement.

It is achieved through redundancy, failover mechanisms, and rigorous maintenance schedules. If an exchange goes offline, traders cannot manage their positions, which can lead to catastrophic losses if the market moves against them.

Therefore, exchanges strive for "five nines" availability, meaning the system is up 99.999% of the time. Achieving this requires constant monitoring, rapid incident response, and a robust architecture that can withstand hardware failures, software bugs, and external attacks.

Service availability is the foundation upon which all other trading functions depend, making it the most critical metric for any exchange.