So I was wondering why the stock market closed on good friday again this year, and honestly it's kind of interesting how this all works. Turns out the NYSE and NASDAQ shut down for this day every year, but here's the thing - it's not even an official federal holiday in the US. Wild right?

The real reason is just tradition going back to like the 1800s. Nobody made them do it, they just kind of started doing it and never stopped. Makes sense though when you think about it - if a bunch of traders take the day off anyway for religious reasons or whatever, you end up with fewer people trading, which can get messy with volatility and liquidity issues. So they figured might as well just close the whole thing.

Bond markets close too, which is why it became this de facto market holiday even though most other industries don't really care. This year good friday was april 17, and yeah, the stock market closed for the full day. People got to take it off whether they celebrate it religiously or not.

Interesting part is you don't have to be religious to use the day for something meaningful. Could volunteer, spend time with people, reflect on stuff, whatever. The day kind of ended up being about more than just religion at this point - it's become this cultural thing about taking a step back and thinking about compassion and all that.