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DLJ Bowl: Free trades
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January 28, 2000: 7:25 a.m. ET
Instead of Rams and Titans, online broker makes pitch to bulls and bears
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NEW YORK (CNNfn) - Tired of the hype? Never really liked football? Or did your team fizzle and now you just don't care? One online trading firm -- in a kind of contrarian advertising move -- has just the ticket for you: free stock trades on Super Bowl Sunday.
"We think commission-free online trades on game day are a good way to distinguish DLJdirect from the competition, express our appreciation to our existing customers, and to introduce DLJdirect to investors who value a serious, reliable and responsible approach to managing their money," said Blake Darcy, chief executive officer of the online arm of Donaldson, Lufkin, & Jenrette.
 "I'm a bear?"
Of course, U.S. markets aren't open on Sunday, so the commission free stock trades will only apply to market orders placed on Jan. 30 for execution on Jan. 31. Still, it's a chance for customers to save $20 on the typical transaction.
It's also an attempt by DLJdirect to garner some Super Bowl-related attention without paying big league prices. TV spots during the event are going for as much as $3 million for 30 seconds. Dot-com companies are taking roughly one-third of the spots.
"From a branding perspective, the Super Bowl is a terrific, but very fleeting, opportunity to build consumer awareness in millions of households through a single broadcast," Darcy said in the firm's announcement.
If you decide to trade, you may want to wait until the final whistle. After all, according to Wall Street wisdom based on historic -- but not 100 percent correlated -- data on conference wins and market performance, if the St. Louis Rams of the National Football Conference win, 2000 will likely be a bull market. If the Titans of the American Football Conference rule, then the bears will reign.
Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette (DLJ: Research, Estimates) shares closed Thursday at 50-3/8, down 1-1/8. 
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