On Sunday, October 27, the U.K. and all of Europe will return to Standard Time.
This time change will involve all of the 43 countries (and principalities) situated between the Atlantic Ocean and the Russian border, except Belarus.
Listed geographically, from west to east:
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In the U.K. (including the Channel Islands), the BST (GMT+1) time zone will change to GMT.
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In the western European time zone — in Ireland, the IST (GMT+1) time zone will change to GMT, and in Portugal, the WEST (GMT+1) time zone will change to GMT.
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In the central European time zone (comprising 30 countries and principalities from Spain east to Serbia, and from Sweden south to Malta), the CEST (GMT+2) time zone will change to CET (GMT+1). — See the box, below.
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In the 10 countries within the eastern European time zone (Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Ukraine, Moldova, Romania, Bulgaria, Greece, and Cyprus), the EEST (GMT+3) time zone will change to EET (GMT+2).
Clocks in all of these countries will be turned back one hour, prior to the opening of the forex market on Monday morning, October 28.
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For traders in all of these countries, opening and closing times in the London Session and in the European Session will not change, but the trading sessions in Tokyo and New York will begin and end one hour earlier than previously, starting Monday morning.
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For traders in countries not listed above, the only change will be that the London Session and the European Session will begin and end one hour later than previously, starting Monday morning.
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Traders in the U.S. and Canada who trade the European or London Sessions, and traders in the U.K. and Europe who trade the New York Session, should be aware that the usual 5-hour time difference between London and New York will be reduced to 4 hours, for one week, starting on Sunday.
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Also, beginning on Monday morning, and continuing for one week, the heavily-traded London/New York Overlap Session (normally 4 hours in duration) will extend to 5 hours, as follows: 12 pm - 5 pm London time, and 8 am - 1 pm New York time.
The last Daylight Saving Time change for this season will occur on November 3, at which time the U.S. and Canada will end DST and will return to Standard Time.
A year ago, it was REPORTED that a plan was under consideration in the European Union to eliminate annual time changes in 2019. The action-dates in that plan were then postponed to 2020.
The current plan is for all of the European Union to return to Standard Time this weekend, and then go onto European Summer Time (daylight saving time) in the Spring of 2020. Then, each E.U. country will decide whether to (1) stay on Summer Time permanently, or (2) return permanently to Standard Time in the Fall of 2020.
Best scenario — all of the E.U. countries decide to do the same thing. Worst scenario — a patchwork emerges of European countries in two time zones, one hour out-of-sych with each other.
It isn’t clear what the non-E.U. countries in Europe will do, after the E.U. countries have made their decisions. In the CET and EET time zones in Europe, there are 16 countries and principalities which are not E.U. members – Switzerland and Norway being notable examples. Previously, those non-E.U. countries have changed back and forth between Standard Time and Summer Time, along with the E.U. countries.
Will they follow suit with the E.U., if and when the E.U. countries settle permanently on either Standard Time or Summer Time?
Stay tuned.
