The Super Bowl "theory" says that if a team from the original * National Football League wins the Super Bowl, the stock market increases for the rest of the year, and if a team from the old American Football League wins, the stock market goes down.
For 1967-1997 this was right 28 out of 31 times (if you use the Dow Jones Industrial average- DJIA) or 90% of the time. It failed four years in a row from 1998-2001, but still had and 80% success rate thru 2006.

(Note: results are not as good if you use the S&P 500 instead of the DJIA, because there are years when one went up and the other went down.)

New York investment adviser Robert Stovall first noticed the correlation between Super Bowl wins and stock market gains in 1979. It's among the most accurate of the dozens of offbeat economic indicators that market watchers follow.

Economist Paul M. Sommers of Middelbury College in Vermont has analyzed the data for the years from 1967 to 1998 and included the division and total points. He reported his findings in the May, 2000 College Mathematics Journal. Sommers' model suggests that the stock market posts a significantly higher gain if the Super Bowl winner is from the National Football Conference Western Division. Moreover, the higher the combined team point totals are, the lower the percentage change in the Dow Jones Industrial Average.

The fact that the NVC dominated up till 1997 and the market has a general tendency to go up helped.

Super Bowl winners and the Dow Jones Industrial Avereage
Year Num Winner Conf Total
Points
% Change
in DJIA
Theory
Result
1967   Green Bay NFC 45 8.38  
1968   Green Bay NFC 47 4.98  
1969   New York Jets AFC 23 -13.52  
1970   Kansas City AFC 30 5.11  
1971   Baltimore * NFL/
AFC
29 5.26  
1972   Dallas NFC 27 12.5  
1973   Miami AFC 21 -18.14  
1974   Miami AFC 31 -26.77  
1975   Pittsburgh * NFL/
AFC
22 29.39  
1976   Pittsburgh NFL/
AFC
38 8.07  
1977   Oakland AFC 46 -15.46  
1978   Dallas NFC 37 3.77  
1979   Pittsburgh NFL/
AFC
66 0.15  
1980   Pittsburgh NFL/
AFC
50 11.17  
1981   Oakland AFC 37 -6.93  
1982   San Francisco NFC 47 23.85  
1983   Washington NFC 44 18.21  
1984   L.A. Raiders AFC 47 -3.78
1985   San Francisco NFC 54 26.02  
1986   Chicago NFC 56 23.92  
1987   New York Giants NFC 59 -7.74  
1988   Washington NFC 52 10.74  
1989   San Francisco NFC 36 23.17  
1990   San Francisco NFC 65 2.91
1991   New York Giants NFC 39 19.16  
1992   Washington NFC 61 2.11  
1993   Dallas NFC 69 13.42  
1994   Dallas NFC 43 -2.81  
1995   San Francisco NFC 75 32.64  
1996   Dallas NFC 44 22.32  
1997   Green Bay NFC 56 18.1  
1998   Denver AFC 55 20.61  
1999   Denver AFC 53 22.85  
2000   St. Louis NFC 39 -6.1  
2001   Baltimore AFC 41 -7.1  
2002   New England AFC 37 -16.8  
2003   Tampa Bay NFC 69 23.9  
2004   New England AFC 61 3.1  
2005   New England AFC 45 -0.8
2006   Pittsburgh NFL/
AFC
31 16.3  
2007   Indianapolis NFL/
AFC
46 7.2  
2008 XLII NY Giants NFC 31 -34  
2009 XLIII Pittsburg NFL/
AFC
50    
2010 XLIV New Orleans AFC 48    
2011 XLV Green Bay NFC 56    
2012 XLVI NY Giants NFC 38    
2013 XLVII Baltimore Ravens NFC 65    
2014 XLVIII Seattle Seahawks NFC 51    
* In 1970, NFL teams Pittsburgh, Baltimore and Cleveland joined 10 AFL teams to form the American Football Conference, so they are still counted as NFL teams.
By 2001 the Baltimore Colts had moved to Indianapolis and the Baltimore Ravens were an AFC team.

† - In 1984 and 2005 the S&P 500 went up while the Dow was flat or went down slightly. In 1990 the S&P went down and the Dow went up.

References:
Sommers, P.M. 2000. The Super Bowl theory: Fourth and long. College Mathematics Journal 31(May):189.
Peterson, I. 2000. Super Bowls and stock markets. Science News 157(June 17):399.

Links:
Ivars Peterson's MathTrek
Business Week


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last updated 8 Sep 2012