May 25 (Bloomberg) -- Mark Haines, a fixture at financial- news network CNBC for 22 years, has died. He was 65.
He died yesterday at his home, the network reported, without citing a cause.
In an era when youth and Hollywood good looks were often prized as the face of financial news on television, Haines was a throwback.
He joined CNBC in 1989 and was a founding anchor of its morning show, “Squawk Box,” in August 1995, when the Dow Jones Industrial Average was about 4600. He told the Chicago Tribune in 2001 that the ensuing boom years -- in which the Dow tripled -- were a heyday for his business, at least until stock-market losses and widespread layoffs made business news gloomy again.
“Now I hear it from viewers who say they can’t stand it anymore,” he told the newspaper. “They say they can’t watch it.”
CNBC President Mark Hoffman called Haines a “building block” of the network’s programming.
“With his searing wit, profound insight and piercing interview style, he was a constant and trusted presence in business news for more than 20 years,” Hoffman said in a statement to CNBC employees. “From the dot-com bubble to the tragic events of 9/11 to the depths of the financial crisis, Mark was always the unflappable pro.”
He most recently worked as one of the co-anchors of the network’s “Squawk on the Street.” CNBC is a unit of NBC Universal, which is controlled by Philadelphia-based Comcast Corp.
Before joining CNBC, based in Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, Haines was a news anchor for KYW-TV in Philadelphia, WABC-TV in New York and WPRI-TV in Providence, Rhode Island, according to CNBC.
He had a law degree from the University of Pennsylvania Law School and was a member of the New Jersey State Bar.
His survivors include his wife, Cindy, and his two children, Matthew and Meredith, the New York Times reported.
--Editors: Charles W. Stevens, Steven Gittelson
To contact the reporter on this story: Laurence Arnold in Washington at larnold4@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Charles W. Stevens at cstevens@bloomberg.net
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