Michael Bloomberg

Michael Bloomberg is the founder, CEO, and majority owner of Bloomberg LP, the global financial data and media company that revolutionized how the world's financial professionals access information. After being let go from Salomon Brothers in 1981 with a $10 million severance, Bloomberg used the money to found Innovative Market Systems, which developed the Bloomberg Terminal — a groundbreaking computer system that gave traders and analysts instant access to real-time financial data, analytics, and news. The terminal became the indispensable tool of Wall Street and the global financial industry.

Bloomberg LP has grown from that single product into a vast media and information empire encompassing Bloomberg News, Bloomberg Television, Bloomberg Radio, Bloomberg Businessweek, and Bloomberg Opinion. The Bloomberg Terminal remains the company's core product, used by over 325,000 professionals in finance, and the company generates over $12 billion in annual revenue. Bloomberg's combination of technology innovation, data excellence, and journalistic integrity created an entirely new category in financial information services.

Beyond business, Bloomberg served three terms as Mayor of New York City, earning widespread acclaim for his data-driven governance, public health initiatives, and urban development programs. His philanthropic organization, Bloomberg Philanthropies, has given away over $17 billion to causes including public health, climate change, education, and gun safety. He is one of the most generous philanthropists in American history, and his giving focuses on solving problems through data, evidence, and innovation.

Michael Rubens Bloomberg was born on February 14, 1942, in Boston, Massachusetts, to a middle-class family. His father was a bookkeeper at a dairy company who never earned more than $6,000 a year. Bloomberg worked his way through Johns Hopkins University, earning an electrical engineering degree in 1964, then put himself through Harvard Business School, graduating with an MBA in 1966. He joined Salomon Brothers, one of Wall Street's most aggressive investment banks, where he rose to become a partner and head of equity trading and, later, information systems. In 1981, Salomon was acquired by Phibro Corporation, and Bloomberg was let go with a $10 million severance package. At age 39, with no job and a modest fortune, he decided to start a company that would transform how Wall Street consumed information.