As a first step in dealing with last Thursday's market plunge, the Securities and Exchange Commission has agreed with six financial markets to strengthen circuit breakers–or damage-controlling procedures that temporarily halt trading in the event of severe declines–and develop a framework for handling erroneous trades.

SEC Chairman Mary Schapiro met with leaders from the New York Stock Exchange, NASDAQ, BATS, Direct Edge, International Securities Exchange and Chicago Board Options Exchange Monday to discuss what contributed to the 1,000-point drop, the largest one-day decline on record. Initial reports have largely attributed the nosedive, from which the market mostly recovered by the end of the trading day, to a system error.