NEW YORK (CNN/Money) - Sports curses die hard -- ask any fan of the Boston Red Sox or Chicago Cubs.

But one curse got trampled by Wall Street's bulls in 2003 - the stadium-sponsor curse.

As regular readers of this column know, for at least the last few years, the curse attacked the companies with enough hubris to put their names on major professional sports facilities in North America. There have been 10 bankruptcies among sponsors since the start of 2001, enough to bring a smile to the face of those who hate corporate names on their favorite venue for escapism. And the stocks on the index were mauled even worse than the average 401(k) during the bear years of this young century.

But when the dust and confetti of this year's stock market cleared, the stadium-sponsor index had gone along for the ride. It was up a healthy 27 percent when adjusted for market capitalization -- about the same as the gains in the Dow Jones industrial average and the Standard and Poor's 500, although well behind the rise in the Nasdaq composite index.

In 2002, the index was down a whopping 33 percent, so that was a 60 percentage point turnaround.

The average percentage gain of the 54 stocks on the index during the course of the year was an even healthier 52 percent, but that was helped by eye-popping advances at many of the smaller companies -- three of the six smallest stocks in terms of market cap more than doubled in value in 2003.

Things seemed to have turned around for the index in April, soon after Air Canada's bankruptcy gave the curse the only scalp it would collect in 2003.

American Airlines, which has its names on arenas in both Miami and Dallas, narrowly avoided filing for bankruptcy court protections itself. If American, the world's largest carrier, had been forced into bankruptcy, other competitors were expected to follow suit.

But since April, shares of American's parent AMR Corp., along with much of the rest of the airline sector that is well-represented on the stadium-sponsor index, have soared. Even if losses have continued to dominate the sector, investors are betting the worst of the post-Sept. 11 downturn in the sector is over.

The index's best performer of the year was America West (AWA: Research, Estimates), which saw its stock worth nearly seven times as much at the end of the year as at the beginning. AMR (AMR: Research, Estimates) nearly doubled over the course of 2003, while Continental (CAL: Research, Estimates) more than doubled.

What was more impressive is that the index saw only six stocks lose ground in 2003 -- or only one more than the number of companies to file for bankruptcy in 2002. Even bankrupt United Airlines parent UAL Corp. (UALAQ: Research, Estimates) managed to post a modest gain of its delisted shares, though its shareholders could still end up wiped out if and when the airline emerges from bankruptcy.

It hasn't all been good news for the index components this year.

State and federal regulators sued Invesco Fund Group Inc. in December, charging it allowed numerous hedge funds to make improper trades in the company's mutual funds. Shares of Invesco parent Amvescap (AVZ: Research, Estimates), which ended the year up 17 percent, are off 18 percent from its high of the year before the mutual fund scandal broke.

SportsBiz Click here for SportsBiz column archive Click here for SI.com sports coverage Click here to email Chris Isidore

Xcel Energy (XEL: Research, Estimates) had one of its units -- NRG Energy -- file for bankruptcy in May, although it did little damage to its share price, which ended up more than 50 percent for the year.

So what's the future for the curse? It's tough to say. Maybe the curse is something that only rears its head during the difficult times, tipping situations at companies with the ego to be sponsors from bad to worse.

It's possible the curse has cleaned out the more suspect stadium sponsors -- the Enrons, WorldComs and Adelphias of the world whose sponsorship of arenas and stadium seemed to be part of a corporate culture that led to underlying problems. Not to suggest those kinds of companies no longer exist, but they don't seem to be rushing to hang their names up high any longer.

YOUR E-MAIL ALERTS Business of Sports Stock Exchanges Bankruptcy Airlines or Create your own Manage alerts | What is this?

The most recent sponsorship deal is the one announced was by the relatively staid Toyota Motor (TM: Research, Estimates) for the Houston basketball arena.

Some of the companies are pulling back from the world of sponsorships. Several major facilities, including the Superdome in New Orleans, still haven't been able to land a corporate name despite an improved advertising market. California energy company Edison International (EIX: Research, Estimates) announced just last week that its name was coming off the baseball stadium in Anaheim.

But I think it's too soon to say the curse is dead. Like a movie villain, I think we may see it spring to life a few more times before we can be assured it is finally dispatched.

At least I hope it's not gone -- companies who make us go to Megacorp Stadium or Behemoth Inc. Arena to try to forget our worries should have to pay a price above a couple of million of dollars a year for intruding that way.