F rancesco Gaetano Caltagirone is an Italian billionaire with a vast and powerful business empire spanning construction, cement, real estate, and media. He is the patriarch of the influential Caltagirone family. He inherited a construction company and, along with his brothers, vastly expanded the family's business interests, becoming one of Italy's most powerful industrialists.

He is the controlling shareholder of the Caltagirone Group, which includes a portfolio of major publicly traded companies. These include the cement giant Cementir Holding, the construction and real estate firm Caltagirone S.p.A., and Caltagirone Editore, a major newspaper publisher. He is also a significant and influential shareholder in the Italian insurance behemoth, Assicurazioni Generali, and the investment bank Mediobanca, making him a central and often confrontational figure in the elite circles of Italian finance.