Wake Up! Here Come the Night-Cap Stocks

By Frank Pellegrini Friday, May 28, 1999

Yes kids, the end of quality time is nigh. The bigwigs at Nasdaq have set in motion a plan to conduct an evening trading session, allowing brokers and online investors alike to buy and sell the index's 100 largest stocks from 5:30 until as late as 9:00 or 10:00 p.m. E.T. "This is very much a product of the stock-crazed world that we're living in right now," says TIME Wall Street columnist Daniel Kadlec. "A bear market in the next month or two, and this plan will quietly go away -- temporarily. In the end, though, it's inevitable, and before long we'll have twenty-four hour trading."

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Brokerage houses, especially the smaller ones, aren't too excited about having to staff twelve hours of trading. The Mom-and-Pop e-traders, meanwhile, are slavering over the chance to do their trading when they're home from work and able to concentrate -- unless, of course, they've had a few with dinner. Or else they're leery, like many professional traders, about what all-day, all-night investment opportunities will do to their tickers. Kadlec says the plan's success all depends on how many of the former type get hooked. "There's after-hours trading now, and for the most part, nobody shows up." But that's the professional crowd who've been doing it all day -- for dentists and salesmen and mechanics, says Kadlec, "this could be their new hobby, instead of watching TV. Come home, eat, put the kids to sleep. And trade stocks for a few hours before bed." Looks like the kids will be putting on their pajamas earlier than ever.