A major technical outage at Cloudflare on Tuesday, November 18, 2025, triggered widespread disruptions across numerous websites, causing significant operational challenges for businesses worldwide. The network issue resulted in substantial financial losses for contracts for difference (CFD) brokers, with estimates suggesting an average broker lost approximately $1.6 billion in trading volumes during the three-hour disruption.
Financial Impact on Trading Industry
According to a detailed report from FinanceMagnates, the Cloudflare technical problem emerged as a critical event for the financial sector. While brokers typically don't publicly disclose specific outage-related losses, the news portal's analysis provides startling figures about the financial consequences.
The report estimates that the outage may have cost brokers an average of $1.58 billion in trading volumes, representing nearly 1% of their monthly trading revenues. This calculation becomes more significant when examining the broader trading volume context.
Based on data from the third quarter of 2025, excluding the top 10 CFD brokers who reported no outage impact, the remaining brokers demonstrated a maximum monthly trading volume of $416 billion and a minimum of $40 billion. This translates to an average monthly trading volume of $174 billion and a daily trading volume of $7.91 billion, assuming 22 trading days per month.
Brokerage Firms Affected by Service Disruption
The three-hour Cloudflare outage significantly impacted numerous companies, particularly in the forex and contracts for difference sectors. Many brokerage websites displayed 'internal server error' messages, preventing traders from accessing their platforms and executing transactions.
Among the confirmed affected brokerage platforms were Monaxa, Skilling, Xtrade, and FXPro, along with many other financial service providers. The disruption wasn't limited to financial institutions, as Cloudflare's extensive client base includes major technology companies and online platforms.
Other prominent companies experiencing website disruptions during the outage included:
- X (formerly Twitter)
- Spotify
- OpenAI (ChatGPT)
- Perplexity
- Amazon Web Services (AWS)
- Canva
- Letterboxd
- Sage
- PayPal
Understanding the Global Impact
Cloudflare's position as one of the world's largest network operating companies means that any technical issues on their platform can create ripple effects across unrelated services and industries. Companies utilize Cloudflare's services to enhance website speed and protection against digital attacks, making them dependent on the platform's stability.
The outage reportedly intensified between 2 p.m. and 6 p.m. GMT, with peak disruption occurring between 2 p.m. and 4 p.m. GMT. The $1.58 billion trading volume loss represents 0.91% of brokers' monthly trading volume, a significant impact for a three-hour period.
Importantly, the news portal highlighted that these estimated losses might be partial, as traders often return to settle their positions after such outages resolve. This suggests the actual financial impact could be even more substantial than initial calculations indicate.
This incident underscores the critical dependency modern businesses have on reliable internet infrastructure and the substantial financial consequences that can result from technical disruptions at major service providers like Cloudflare.
