Not everyone on the committee echoed that sentiment. Schapiro said the market had already declined 161 points, by 2:00 p.m. over the financial meltdown in Greece, uncertainty surrounding elections in the United Kingdom, and an upcoming jobs report.

"Shortly after 2:30 p.m., however, the market decline began to steepen and, by 2:42 p.m., the DJIA was at 10,445.84, representing a decline of approximately 3.9%. The DJIA then suddenly dropped an additional 573.27 points, representing an additional 5.49% decline, in just the next five minutes of trading, hitting 9,872.57 at 2:47 p.m., for a total drop of 9.16% from the previous day's close," she said.

Industry experts said it was obvious that there was some sort of "algorithmic error" in the computerized trading systems that caused the pricing in the markets to collapse.

Some attempting to short-sell 16 million shares of S&P 500 stock, but instead of entering a "m" for million, he entered a "b" for billion. That error allegedly sent high frequency traders scurrying, causing liquidity to vanish.

"While we cannot yet definitely rule that possibility out, neither our review nor reviews by the relevant exchanges and market participants have uncovered such an error," Schapiro testified.