NASDAQ Unit Behind Twitter Earnings Leak

Nasdaq (NASDAQ:NDAQ) has confirmed to FOXBusiness.com that it was responsible for the Twitter (NYSE:TWTR) earnings leak after its Shareholder.com unit, which handles investor services, published the first quarter results before the close of trading Tuesday.

“At 3:07pm,  Shareholder.com inadvertently made an early version of Twitter’s earnings release publicly accessible. We are investigating the root cause. It did not impact any other Shareholder.com clients,” said Joe Christinat, a Nasdaq spokesperson.

The leak, which was picked up by multiple media outlets, caused Twitter shares to plummet by as much as 7% before the stock was halted.  Twitter wound up releasing the earnings shortly before the closing bell. Shares tumbled 18% to $42.27 after revenue missed Wall Street forecasts.

Both The New York Stock Exchange (NYSE:ICE), which won Twitter's IPO listing, and Nasdaq confirmed that all trades in Twitter will stand despite the early release.

This is not the first snafu at Shareholder.com. The investor relations services company was linked to a similar problem with J.P. Morgan’s (NYSE:JPM) earnings in October.  Nasdaq purchased the unit in 2006.