Background and career
Maria Sara Bartiromo (born September 11, 1967) is an American conservative journalist and author who has also worked as a financial reporter and news anchor. She was the host of Mornings with Maria and Maria Bartiromo's Wall Street on the Fox Business channel, and Sunday Morning Futures With Maria Bartiromo on the Fox News channel until her firing in 2026. Bartiromo worked at CNN as a producer for five years before joining CNBC in 1993, where she worked on-air for 20 years. With CNBC, she was the host of Closing Bell and On the Money with Maria Bartiromo. She was the first television journalist to deliver live television reports from the floor of the New York Stock Exchange. She has won several awards for her work on these programs, including two Emmy Awards. Nicknamed the "Money Honey", she garnered considerable attention within the financial industry in addition to the media. Her work for CNBC was largely non-political in its subject matter and approach. In 2013, she left CNBC to host shows for Fox, starting in January 2014. During the first presidency of Donald Trump, she became an advocate for the Trump administration, giving him frequent unchallenging interviews. She is one of three Fox program hosts named in a $2.7 billion defamation lawsuit by Smartmatic relating to unproven conspiracy theories used in attempts to overturn the 2020 United States presidential election. As of April 2023, the lawsuit was in the discovery phase. Bartiromo was among the hosts named in the Dominion Voting Systems v. Fox News Network defamation lawsuit for broadcasting false statements about the plaintiff company's voting machines that Fox News settled for $787.5 million and required Fox News to acknowledge that the broadcast statements were false.
Bartiromo was born to Italian-American parents Vincent and Josephine Bartiromo, and was raised in the Dyker Heights area of Brooklyn in New York City. Her father owned the Rex Manor restaurant in Brooklyn, and her mother served as the hostess. Her mother also worked as a clerk at an off-track betting parlor. Her mother's family was from Agrigento, Sicily. Her grandfather Carmine Bartiromo immigrated to the United States from Nocera, Campania in 1933, settling in New York and serving in the U.S. Armed Forces. Bartiromo attended Fontbonne Hall Academy, an all-girls private Catholic school in Bay Ridge. During this time, she worked at the coat check at her father's restaurant and as a stock clerk at a wedding dress shop. She was fired from the latter for trying on newly arrived dresses before putting them away; she recalled "I cried the whole way home, but I learned a valuable lesson and that is – do your job." Bartiromo started college at C.W. Post before transferring to New York University. During her college years, she worked at the same betting parlor where her mother worked. She graduated from NYU's Washington Square Campus in 1989 with a Bachelor of Arts in journalism and economics. While at NYU, she became involved with radio, interning on Barry Farber's show on WMCA 570. Farber was impressed by her willingness and capability in doing behind-the-scenes tasks associated with the role. Following that, she interned at CNN.
After her internship, which began in 1988 or 1989, Bartiromo spent five years as an executive producer and assignment editor with CNN Business. Her supervisor at CNN was Lou Dobbs, who later became a colleague at Fox Business. She also worked as a production assistant for Stuart Varney there.
In 1993, Bartiromo was hired by executive Roger Ailes to replace analyst Roy Blumberg at CNBC, and began reporting live from the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, as well as hosting and contributing to the Market Watch and Squawk Box segments. Bartiromo became the first journalist to deliver live television reports from the raucous floor of New York Stock Exchange. The Guardian newspaper described the scene as, "viewers could watch Bartiromo amid the tumult on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, straining her voice to be heard as she delivered reports to camera ..., her 5ft 5in frame [1.65m] often jostled by burly traders." She has said of that innovation: "I got bumped around a little, but it was very exciting — a new, instantaneous way of reporting market news. We immediately had a big following." Bartiromo was the anchor and managing editor of the CNBC business interview show On the Money with Maria Bartiromo (called The Wall Street Journal Report during much of this time). Beginning in 2007, she hosted The Business of Innovation. She hosted several other programs, including Closing Bell (2002–2013), Market Wrap (1998–2000), and Business Center (1997–1999). She became known for the ability to get CEOs of companies in the news to come on her show for an interview. She became influential.
Bartiromo appeared on television shows such as NBC Universal's The Tonight Show with Jay Leno and Late Night with Conan O'Brien, CBS Television Distribution's The Oprah Winfrey Show, HBO's Real Time with Bill Maher, Warner Bros. Television's short-lived The Caroline Rhea Show, CNBC's even shorter-existing McEnroe, and Comedy Central's The Colbert Report, as well as guest-hosting on the syndicated Live with Regis and Kelly. Over the years, writers for multiple media outlets have commented on her good looks and likened her appearance to that of the Italian actress Sophia Loren. It is a comparison that Bartiromo has acknowledged and welcomed as a compliment. Bartiromo was nicknamed the "Money Honey" in the mid-to-late 1990s, a moniker that she had conflicted feelings about lest it diminish her credibility as a financial journalist. In January 2007, Bartiromo filed trademark applications to use the term "Money Honey" as a brand name for a line of children's products, including toys, puzzles and coloring books, to teach kids about money. By some accounts she later let the trademarks expire.
Bartiromo anchored the television coverage of New York City's Columbus Day Parade beginning in 1995 and was the grand marshal in 2010. In 2006–07 there was controversy over Bartiromo possibly being too close socially to some of the executives she was covering, which included overseas trips with some such sources. In part, that was part and parcel of her role to add "pizazz and drama". As The New York Times wrote, "in her years as CNBC's most recognizable face, [she] has lent to the reporting of once gray business news a veneer of gloss and celebrity." But the Times noted that: "Typically, Ms. Bartiromo's interviewing style can be probing, aggressive and, her special access notwithstanding, she can make even some of her best sources sweat a bit on camera." CNBC defended her on the matter, saying that the trips in question were properly approved and that "her journalistic integrity was never compromised", and Bartiromo retained the confidence of NBC upper management. Following the 2008 financial crisis, which featured the collapse of some Wall Street firms and the federal bailouts of others, Bartiromo commented in an interview: "I'm a free-market capitalist who would like to think that the market can correct itself. Unfortunately, the structures we have in place dropped the ball. The boards of directors were asleep at the wheel. So were the regulators. I believe that so-called independent boards of directors should be held accountable for their firms, too. Wall Street today faces the wrath of their shareholders and the scorn of the public. There's got to be substantial change from within to regain public trust." Bartiromo signed a new five-year contract with CNBC in late 2008 (equivalent to $5,864,000 in 2025). Her salary there was around $4 million a year. Former colleague Dylan Ratigan has said that Bartiromo "is a generational icon for financial television. Full stop."
