[M. O'brien:] You know, when I played "Monopoly," I never liked having the utilities. Did you like having the utilities?
[Andy Serwer, "fortune":] Steady dividend. Steady.
[M. O'brien:] It would apparently be a good buy right now, right, Andy Serwer?
[Serwer:] Absolutely. I'll tell you what's going on right now, is demand for electricity, because of the summer heat wave, is soaring. And that's good news for the utility companies, as Miles is suggesting. Electricity usage is probably going to set a record for last week. The numbers not quite in. Breaking the readings set in August of '02. New York state has already set a record. And, of course, the big thing on everyone's mind is going to be blackouts, because you remember a couple years ago in the northeast we had that terrible situation, and then in California in '01 those horrible brown outs and blackouts. So far this summer, there really haven't been any to speak of. Chicago had a few scattered blackouts, and there were rumors of blackouts and brown outs in California that were supposed to occur, but have not. So interesting stuff. And the other thing that's contributing to this is that the economy's in pretty good shape. So you have the economy kind of firing on, well, pretty much all cylinders, and then plus the heat. And that's going to make electricity usage soar. So that's what's going on there.
[M. O'brien:] So we should buying utilities.
[Serwer:] Yes, indeed. Let's talk about the markets, though. I'm supposed to get to that. And we had a mixed picture yesterday on Wall Street. It's earnings season, so DuPont dragged the Dow down a little bit, whereas Amazon.com had some good numbers that helped out the NASDAQ. And futures are flat today. Big news. Oil inventories going to be reported later on. Price probably will drop, because I think inventories might be a little bit higher than people are expecting. A lot of energy news.
[S. O'brien:] Yes, sure. Andy, thanks. Have you guys seen this new show on FOX?
[M. O'brien:] Which one?
[S. O'brien:] The one about dancing.
[Serwer:] Yes, I have.
[S. O'brien:] Have you? It's good, isn't it? Yet another one.
[M. O'brien:] Another dance contest.
[S. O'brien:] "So You Think You Can Dance"
[Serwer:] Yes, right.
[S. O'brien:] They're knocking off, essentially, the "Dancing with the Stars" at
[Abc. O'brien:] Oh, you mean, they're copying?
[S. O'brien:] Kind of copying. Sort of copying. Anyway I mean, look, wouldn't you watch this?
[M. O'brien:] I'm just watching now. Yes, I'm liking this.
[S. O'brien:] Is this new dance craze catching on? Could you do that if you wanted to? A look at that's ahead on "90 Second Pop."
[M. O'brien:] I'll try that.