UPDATE:Charles Schwab Hit By Online Outages In Busy Trading Stretch

Retail brokerage giant Charles Schwab was experiencing outages on its site early Friday morning. The broker was responding to frustrated customers on Twitter, directing them to a toll-free number: "We are experiencing system issues, please call 800-435-4000 for urgent matters. We'll let you know when we know more," read one tweet. A Schwab spokesman, Greg Gable, confirmed the outages via email and said the company had resolved the issue, which he said was "unrelated to volume." However, Schwab's tech glitch comes during a string of outages at retail brokerages this week as stock markets have seen some of their most dramatic swings in trading. That includes TD Ameritrade which saw customers on Monday report trouble accessing their accounts as stocks suffered a stunning 1,000-point drop at the open.