Herstatt’s counterparties in the USA, where the trading day was just about to open, had already irrevocably delivered their deutschmark liabilities to Herstatt and now lost their US dollar claims. This led to a chain reaction on the US market. The counterparties had to find the outstanding US dollars some other way. The disruptions spread further in New York. According to estimates, the gross volume of transfers fell by 60% in the following three days. Total trading between the US dollar and the deutschmark came almost to a standstill, since the banks held back on meeting their foreign exchange trading liabilities and only delivered against confirmation of receipt of the counter payment. The markets took several days to recover