24. Joseph Ficalora

As the CEO and president of New York Community Bancorp, Joseph Ficalora heads the 22nd largest bank holding company in the country, with assets of $48.9 billion. He’s been the president of the Asset Management Fund-Large Cap Equity Fund since 2004, and president of New York Commercial Bank since 2005. He currently serves as a member of the American Bankers Council of the American Bankers Association and a director of the New York Bankers Association. He serves on the Boards of Directors of RSI Retirement Trust and Peter B. Cannel & Col, Inc., an investment advisory firm. Since 1990, he’s also been on the Board of Directors of the Queens Chamber of Commerce, the Foreign Policy Association, New York-Presbyterian/Queens and the Flushing Cemetery. Under his leadership, Bancorp evolved from a mutual savings bank with seven branches in Queens and Nassau into a publicly traded multi-bank holding company, with 255 branch offices serving consumers and businesses throughout the New York metropolitan area, as well as in New Jersey, Florida, Ohio and Arizona—and that also includes 225 branches of the Community Bank, the largest U.S. thrift. Ficalora has promoted the growth of his bank through a series of acquisitions that has made it one of the leading producers of multi-family loans on non-luxury, rent-regulated buildings in one of the largest cities in the world. Banking runs in Ficalora’s blood, and Long Islanders’ fiscal futures are more secure because of it.