(Corrects lead to show closed building was not Nasdaq headquarters)
NEW YORK, Dec 30 (Reuters) - New York City's Times Square was closed briefly and three buildings including a Nasdaq NDAQ.O building were evacuated in a security scare on Wednesday, a day before the traditional New Year's Eve festivities in the famed intersection.
The street closings and evacuations were prompted by a police investigation of a suspicious van that local media reported had been parked on Broadway for two days.
No explosives were found in the van, which police examined with robots and remote cameras.
The typically busy Times Square intersection, Nasdaq building and two other buildings were cleared of people during the investigation which lasted about two hours.
Times Square was already crowded with tourists and a heavy police presence ahead of the traditional New Year’s Eve festivities and the dropping of a large lit ball at midnight on Dec. 31.
Trade on the Nasdaq .IXIC stock market went uninterrupted and the impact was minimal.
“There was a quick small sell-off in equities which would be more attributable to people closing some positions in fear of an electronic breakdown rather than initiating speculative short positions,” said Joe Kinahan, chief derivatives strategist at TD Ameritrade.
The incident took place less than a week after a botched attempt on Christmas Day to blow up a U.S.-bound airliner. The airline incident has prompted heightened air travel security. (Reporting by Doris Frankel, Ellen Wulfhorst and Elinor Comlay; Editing by Daniel Trotta and Vicki Allen)
Photo of suspicious van  
Times Square was shut down today due to a suspicious vehicle parked on 42nd Street and Broadway in New York.  Police cordoned the area surrounding the white 1992 Dodge van to investigate the auto. The van has temporary license plates and tinted windows with tarps covering them.
Photo of the van from the back with doors open 
The nearby NASDAQ building was evacuated, and reports from CBS said the Conde Nast building had been partially evacuated.

The investigation disrupted preparations for the New Year's eve ball drop atop One Times Square, although it still appears that the celebration will continue unaffected.

The investigation comes a day after police commissioner Raymond Kelly was interviewed by local TV outlet, WNBC, about how the city is after recent terrorist activity. "Reality is that New York is the number one target in this country ... But it has been doing more than any other city in America and probably the world," he said on the topic that New York had adequate counter-terrorism procedure. ''Wikinews'' contacted the New York City Police Department, but they had no comment about the specific issue at this time.