Fox Business Network (FBN)

Background

FOX Business Network is a financial cable news channel and website with information across all platforms. ¹

The outlet is generally viewed as right-leaning, based on a focus group by the organization All Sides and has traditionally conservative, pro-business, libertarian coverage. ⁴ The website Media Bias Fact Check categorizes Fox Business as “right-center.” ⁵

A 2024 survey by YouGov found that Fox Business has an overwhelmingly conservative-leaning audience. ³

Launched in October 2007, Fox Business Network is based in New York, with bureaus in Chicago, Los Angeles, and Washington, D.C. ^{2 1}

Prior to FBN’s launch, CNBC was the only 24-hour business news network. ⁶

The network covers global markets, economic policy, investing, technology, personal finance, business leaders, and small business. ⁶

Some of the main programs on FBN are “Mornings with Maria,” hosted by Maria Bartiromo; “Varney and Co.,” hosted by Stuart Varney; and “Kudlow,” hosted by Larry Kudlow, who served in the first Trump administration as director of the National Economic Council. ⁶

Audience

As of June 2026, Fox Business Network says its television channel is available in about 60 million homes in all markets across the United States. ²

The Washington Examiner reported that Nielsen Media Research data for 2025 showed that “Kudlow” and “Varney and Co.” were the top two business news programs for 2025, beating out CNBC competition. “Kudlow” averaged 290,000 viewers, beating CNBC’s “Closing Bell” by 72 percent. Varney and Co. had 276,000, beating its CNBC rivals by 32 percent. Also, “Mornings with Maria” had125,000 viewers, beating CNBC’s “Squawk Box.” ⁷

The data reportedly showed that Fox Business Network closed 2025 with 227,000 business-day viewers between 9:30 a.m. through 5 p.m., and 221,000 market-hour viewers, watching from 9 a.m. through 4 p.m. Monday through Friday. ⁸

Leadership

Fox Business Network is owned by FOX Corporation and is a unit of FOX News Media. ¹

As of June 2026, Suzanne Scott was the CEO of FOX News Media; Joe Dorrego was the chief operating officer and chief financial officer of FOX News Media; Jay Wallace was the president and executive editor of FOX News Media; and Tom Lowell was the senior executive vice president and managing editor of FOX News Channel and FOX Business Network. ⁶

History

News Corp. owner Rupert Murdoch and then-Fox News CEO Roger Ailes began working on the Fox Business Network project two years before its launch, and invested about $100 million in it as they lined up cable and satellite operators. ⁹

Ailes previously started CNBC before he founded Fox Business Network. ¹⁰ After the FBN launch in October 2007, Ailes criticized CNBC, saying, “They used to get really excited if a C.E.O. was going to jail and they got depressed if a company announced a profit. They are offended by rich people unless it’s them.” ¹⁰

A New York Times review of the first week of the network criticized it for being “Relentlessly, incorrigibly, unapologetically upbeat.” ¹⁰

Neil Cavuto, who was named Fox Business’s managing editor and anchored a show, said upon the launch, “We don’t use jargon, and we don’t use analysts. We’re not afraid to defy what seems to be conventional wisdom.” ¹⁰

In October 2015, FBN teamed with the Wall Street Journal to host a Republican presidential primary debate, hosted by Maria Bartiromo and Neil Cavuto of Fox Business, as well as Gerard Baker of the Journal. ⁶

Lou Dobbs previously had one of the highest-rated shows on Fox Business, but the show was cancelled in February 2021. Dobbs came to the network from CNN 10 years earlier. He left the network after he supported on air Donald Trump’s unsupported claim that the 2020 election was stolen by then-President Joe Biden. ¹¹

In September 2023, Fox Business teamed with Univision and Rumble to host the second Republican presidential primary debate at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, California. ⁶