Tootsie Roll Catalyst
Timing is everything on Wall Street. And while Y2k issues at the turn of the century turned out to be overblown, this Sunday dawned with many mobile phone clocks displaying the wrong time due to changes in daylight savings time. Apparently the network operators goofed.
Daylight savings time might become more important with crude at $90, but there is a Halloween angle to the date change. Is it time to buy Tootsie Roll Industries (TR-NYSE)?:
Daylight saving time has historically been used as a way to reduce energy usage, Prerau said. That benefit, however, has been debated, Downing pointed out.
But one big advantage of changing the date in the fall is that now daylight saving time includes Halloween, giving children one more hour of daylight as they trick-or-treat.
“That night has a very high rate of children’s traffic accidents. The hope was that it would reduce that number to some extent,” Prerau said.
The rate of child pedestrian accidents and deaths about quadruple on Oct. 31, he said. An extra hour of daylight means an extra hour that kids will be more visible to drivers.
Of course, the candy manufacturers are likely happy about the change too, Downing said.
“They’ve been pushing for it for 30 years,” he said, adding that candy manufacturers think they’d be able to profit enormously if kids stay out an extra hour trick-or-treating.
It’s a possibility: When a month of daylight saving time was added in the 1980s, both the barbeque industry and the golf industry saw increases in sales due to the extra hours of light people had after work, Downing said.
Will the fed trick or treat the fixed income markets tomorrow? It could be a scary day if they do not move.
Fall back
Marketwatch
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