JAY Z TOPS THE DAILY NEWS LIST OF HOT NEW YORKERS OF 2009!

The Big Apple's reigning rapper has had a banner year.
Shawn (Jay-Z) Carter left Def Jam Recordings and struck an unprecedented $150 million deal with Live Nation in May, allowing him to create a joint record label, talent/management agency and music publishing company under the umbrella Roc Nation.

The $82 million music mogul dropped "The Blueprint 3" in September, selling 476,000 copies its first week and becoming iTunes' eighth-best-selling digital album of the year. He dethroned Elvis Presley as the best-selling solo artist when "The Blueprint 3" became Young Hov's 11th album to reach No. 1 on the Billboard 200 (the King only had 10).

The third album in his "Blueprint" trilogy didn't stop there. The record's hit single, "Empire State
of Mind," with Alicia Keys, became the city's unofficial anthem during the New York Yankees' World Series win in November, and hit No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart.

As further proof of his popularity, the 20,000 tickets to the 40-year-old rapper's 9/11 charity show at Madison Square Garden in September sold out in seconds. The devoted New Yorker donated all of the show's proceeds to benefit the families of fallen NYPD officers and firefighters.

It doesn't stop there: He was named MVP of the Year at the BET Awards in October, and performed at both the MTV Video Music Awards and the American Music Awards.

Jay-Z really does "Run This Town": The urban entrepreneur co-owns The 40/40 Club in Manhattan and co-produced "Fela!" on Broadway.

He even comes out a winner while co-owning the New Jersey Nets during one of their worst losing streaks, since developer Forest City Ratner cleared its final financial hurdle in December to construct the team's new sports arena as part of the controversial Atlantic Yards project in Brooklyn.

And at the end of the day, he gets to go home to his wife, Beyoncé.

Well done, Jigga Man. Your hometown salutes you.