Diamonds Are a Brokerage Firm's Best Friend
Is this a ballpark or a brokerage office?</br></br>While fans at Busch Stadium in St. Louis watch the high arc of slugger Mark McGwire's latest home run, they also can see a Bank of America sign out of the corners of their eyes. Or if the hit takes too long to come down, fans can check on how the financial markets fared that day: Locally based brokerage firm A.G. Edwards has a sign in left field that displays the close of the Dow Jones Industrial Average.</br></br>New York Mets officials, meanwhile, must think the stands are packed with "day traders" and stock-market fanatics who can't get Wall Street off their minds even during the seventh-inning stretch. Why else would TD Waterhouse Group and Reuters Group co-sponsor not one, but two, stock-quotation tickers in the outfield at Shea Stadium?</br></br>Beer and food companies have long promoted their brands by plastering signs on the walls of sports stadiums and arenas. Now banks, brokerage firms and insurance agencies are getting into the game as the explosion in online investing has expanded the audience for Wall Street's pitch.</br></br>The Mets, who play less than an hour from Wall Street, depending on traffic, recognize that.