NY's Super Bowl victory slows trade on Wall Street

By Daniel Trotta

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Super Bowl hysteria slowed the business of Wall Street on Monday but propelled a cottage industry in championship merchandise as New Yorkers celebrated the Giants's unexpected Super Bowl victory.

Fans stripped to the waist celebrated in the chill on Sunday night after the New York Giants, who actually play their games across the Hudson River in New Jersey, shocked the previously undefeated New England Patriots, 17-14.

The celebration will continue on Tuesday, when New York City stages a ticket-tape parade in the so-called Canyon of Heroes, a stretch of Broadway in the Financial District where heads of state and war victors have been feted.

The big game in American football put the frenzied presidential campaign on hold for a few hours, when advertisers paid some $2.7 million for a 30-second ad in the television event of the year.

The celebratory hangover lasted into Monday morning, when some financial trades were put on hold by dealers still giddy with victory.

"I knew trading flows from the New York desks would be close to nil. And I was right: There's so much stuff going on with the markets but let's face it, those traders are probably not even at their desks yet," said Greg Salvaggio, a senior currency trader at Tempus Consulting in Washington D.C.

"New York will have to literally sober up before we see some trading action out of there," he said.

Thomas di Galoma, head of U.S. government bond trading at Jefferies & Co. in New York, estimated trading volume was 15 to 20 percent below the daily average.