Maria S. Bartiromo

Born in 1967 in Brooklyn, New York, Maria Bartiromo is the youngest of three children. She grew up in a working-class neighborhood with a large Italian population, many of them the children and grandchildren of immigrants. Her father owned a restaurant called the Rex Manor, which he inherited from his father. “My paternal grandfather immigrated from Italy in 1906,” Bartiromo says. “When he arrived, he had $12 in his pocket. In 1933, he built a restaurant called the Rex Manor, naming it for the ship that transported Italians to America in the 1930s.

Bartiromo’s entire family worked at the restaurant, including her mother. “My mother also worked full time as a teller at Off-Track Betting (OTB). She loved her job. She found the atmosphere exciting and the money she earned allowed her to send her children to good schools. She never complained about her long days. She was and still is my hero.”

As a teenager, Bartiromo worked after school and on weekends at the restaurant as a coat-check girl. “Whenever I picture my dad, he is standing in a corner of the Rex Manor kitchen, cooking and sweating with a bandanna tied around his head. The restaurant was big—part restaurant and part catering hall. Weekend wedding receptions, anniversaries, baptisms, and bar mitzvahs kept us busy. If I needed to talk to my dad, it was always while he worked over a hot stove. But for all the pressure he dealt with daily, he never stressed. He was a positive, jolly person who was always supportive of me. His number one favorite thing was family. My parents were married for more than 60 years. They were best friends and they became my best friends. As far as family goes, I’m one of the lucky ones.”

Bartiromo attended an all-girls Catholic high school called Fontbonne Hall Academy. One of her first jobs outside of the restaurant was as a stock girl at Kleinfeld’s, the prestigious wedding dress shop. “It was the first and only job from which I was ever fired,” she says. “I got caught trying on wedding dresses, not once, but three times. When I told my mother about losing my job, she asked me what lesson I had learned from this experience. I was in tears and then she said, ‘When you get a job, do the job—that’s the lesson.’”

When Bartiromo began her college education at New York University (NYU), she was uncertain about a major. She discovered she did well in economics and took several business courses. At the start of her junior year, her mother suggested she try broadcast journalism. “I took a few writing and reporting classes and I absolutely loved it,” Bartiromo says. “I switched my major to journalism and did a minor in economics.”

Bartiromo graduated from NYU in 1989 and began her career at CNN working behind the scenes as a production assistant, writer, and ultimately senior producer. She spent five years learning the fundamentals of television news. In those early days, she honed her skills in writing, research, and segment production, gaining a deep understanding of how financial news was shaped and delivered.

Five years later, Bartiromo felt ready to move forward in her career. “I believed it was time for me to be in front of the camera. I sent clips I had put together to CNBC and was hired in 1993 as a business reporter. Two years later, I became the first reporter to broadcast live from the floor of the New York Stock Exchange. It was a groundbreaking move, but I was not welcomed with open arms by the largely all-male traders, who sometimes shoved and yelled at me to get out of their way. I felt that the only way I could handle the situation was to fully know and understand the market and then to stand firm. I was determined to do this job well and be accepted by the traders, which before long, I was.”

Bartiromo spent 20 years at CNBC and was at the center of some of the most consequential financial and economic stories of the modern era. She was on the front lines of major market-moving events, from daily reporting on the New York Stock Exchange to covering global economic shifts and interviewing top CEOs, policymakers, and financial leaders. Her role gave her what she described as “a front-row seat to some of the most important economic stories in the world,” underscoring the breadth of high-impact coverage she delivered throughout her CNBC career.

In 2013, she moved to FOX News as the host of Opening Bell with Maria Bartiromo. Under her stewardship, the show grew beyond simply covering stocks and bonds to take on a range of subjects, including the broader economy, public policy, and other issues of the day. She emerged as a ratings powerhouse, which prompted FOX to expand her role.

Maria Bartiromo is currently one of the most visible figures in broadcast journalism. She anchors three flagship programs: Mornings with Maria on FOX Business, Maria Bartiromo’s Wall Street on FOX Business, and Sunday Morning Futures with Maria Bartiromo on FOX News. These shows position her at the center of business, economic, and political conversations, allowing her to interview major industry leaders and policymakers while shaping daily market narratives. They are all the leading #1 program in the space.

“One of the first lessons I learned from my parents is the importance of working hard to succeed. They would tell me there are no shortcuts—do the job in front of you and do it to the best of your ability. I have always worked hard; I still am. But I think my story is the definition of the American Dream. I didn’t even know what I wanted to be when I started college and, look—I have been able to rise to the top of my industry because of some very simple rules I follow: Work hard, love what you do, and always do the right thing. I am very proud of my country, which allowed me to freely explore, work, and achieve my goals.”

In 2010, Bartiromo wrote a book called The 10 Laws of Enduring Success. The fundamental qualities she feels are most important include: Self-knowledge—know what you are good at, because it shapes your life and how you pursue success; vision—which is where dreams and actions come together; initiative—because you can’t sort of want your dream, you have to be committed to it; courage—because it allows you to overcome barriers and take risks; integrity—because you can’t have true success without it; adaptability— because change is inevitable; humility—because you should believe in yourself, but don’t think you’re the center of the universe; endurance—which means you think of success as a daily fact of life, not something that comes only at the end of the road; purpose—because we all long to live lives of meaning and fulfillment; and resilience—because our attitudes and abilities allow us to make seemingly impossible comebacks.

Proud of her induction into the Horatio Alger Association, Bartiromo is especially looking forward to mentoring the Scholars. “I want to help the next generation. I want to help them understand how the world works, how business works. If my life experience can help them navigate their careers, I’m happy to do whatever I can.”