Some 1,000 people marched towards the financial district of New York City on Saturday to protest what they call a financial system that favors the rich but state police prevented them from coming near the New York Stock Exchange and from taking over the iconic Wall Street Bull statue.

Protesters who heeded the call of the Adbusters, an activist magazine, instead marched in the surrounding streets disrupting traffic flow and sat on sidewalks.

Some demonstrators sang while others occupied plazas and parks near the area in an attempt to replicate the Egypt uprising in Tahrir Square that eventually led to the ouster of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.

The protesters carried placards with the signs "End the Oligarchy," "Democracy Not Corporatization" or "Revoke Corporate Personhood."
Adbusters, which had been calling for the Wall Street protest since July, was expecting the crowd to swell to 20,000 and camp out there for weeks or months.

Police designated Broad Street at Exchange Street as the protest area but no one used it, according to Paul J. Browne, the Police Department's chief spokesman.

Two protesters were detained for entering a building housing the Bank of America offices.