Christmasy Wall Street

This holiday season, Wall Street is done up in lights and Christmas decorations. The New York Stock Exchange facade is illuminated in green lights this year. In front of the New York Stock Exchange is a 45-foot high Norway Spruce Christmas tree adorned with 3,500 white LED lights, 1,000 multi-colored balls with the NYSE Euronext logo and a 6’ star on top, all supported on an 8’ x 10’ base fashioned as a gold box. The NYSE holiday tree has been Downtown Manhattan tradition since 1923 and is one of the most visited attractions during the holidays.

Protesters Make Some Noise On Wall Street

Hundreds of demonstrators, a loose coalition of left-leaning groups like Adbusters and Anonymous took to the streets of Manhattan's financial district today in a peaceful march and protest to draw attention to the role powerful financial interests played in wreaking havoc on America's economy. The protesters intend to "occupy" Wall Street for several days and come up with "one demand" to be submitted to the White House and to the American media.

Trinity Church, View From Wall Street

Located in Lower Manhattan, at the intersection of Broadway and Wall Street, TRINITY CHURCH was designed by architect RICHARD UPJOHN in Neo-Gothic style. The church was consecrated in 1697 with a grant from King William III of England. The photos above were taken from Wall Street.
From nyc-architecture.com
Prominently located at the terminus of Wall Street on land granted to the congregation by the British crown, this Anglican church has served as an urban landmark since the 19th century. The third church to stand on this site, the current Trinity Church was built by an English cabinet maker who immigrated to the United States and became a leader of the American Gothic Revival. The basilica plan church is built in the English Perpendicular Gothic Style of the 14th century, signaling the arrival of Gothic Revival ideals brought from England to New York in the mid 19th century. The church's stained glass windows recall medieval models, while its ornate bronze doors echo the doors of Florence's Renaissance Baptistry. The use of brownstone signals a popular interest in locally available materials.

WALL STREET - the Proposed Bailout

Today, negotiators from Capitol Hill and the Bush administration resumed talks about the proposed $700 billion bailout of the financial system by the US government. Earlier today, I made some images of the Wall Street sign and the New York Stock Exchange in downtown Manhattan. NYC is at the center of the economic turmoil, but the fallout will be nationwide. Already the financial sector alone has lost 10,000 jobs through July, or about 2% of finance jobs. Moody's Economy.com projects that New York City and its suburbs will lose 65,000 finance jobs by the middle of 2010, or 11% of the total. Economists are projecting that Manhattan real estate prices will finally sink under the pressure of financial-sector layoffs and shrinking Wall Street bonuses. Wall Street accounts for about 12% of jobs in the city of New York, and a quarter of salaries. "New York is the stone in the puddle that ripples across the country," said Scott Simmons, vice-president and founding partner of Crist/Kolder Associates, an executive recruiting firm in Chicago.

From wikipedia:

Wall Street is a street in lower Manhattan, New York City, USA. It runs east from Broadway downhill to South Street on the East River, through the historical center of the Financial District. Wall Street was the first permanent home of the New York Stock Exchange; over time Wall Street became the name of the surrounding geographic neighborhood. Wall Street is also shorthand (or a metonym) for "influential financial interests" in the U.S., as well as for the financial industry in the New York City area. Several major U.S. stock and other exchanges remain headquartered on Wall Street and in the Financial District, including the NYSE, NASDAQ, AMEX, NYMEX, and NYBOT.