Stephen Leeb

Stephen Leeb, Ph.D. is the Chief Investment Strategist of The Complete Investor and Real World Investing.

Dr. Leeb’s books have been notable for predicting the secular bull market that started in the 1980s (Getting in on the Ground Floor, Putnam, 1986); the tech stock crash and rise of real assets, including oil and gold (Defying the Market: Profiting in the Turbulent Post-Technology Market Boom, McGraw-Hill, 1999); and the surge in oil prices (The Oil Factor: Protect Yourself and Profit from the Coming Energy Crisis, Warner Books, 2004). His national bestseller, The Coming Economic Collapse: How You Can Thrive When Oil Costs $200 a Barrel (Warner Books, 2006), co-authored with Glen Strathy, outlined the biggest challenges facing the US economy, and accurately predicted the 2008 sub prime mortgage crisis as well as the vicious subsequent economic cycle requiring massive infusions of government stimulus, near zero interest rates and much higher federal debt levels. Game Over: How You Can Prosper in a Shattered Economy (Business Plus, 2009) predicted a permanent peak in global commodity production. Dr. Leeb’s eighth and latest book, Red Alert (Hachette, 2011), outlined China’s growing prosperity and the ways in which its demands on increasingly scarce resources threaten the American way of life.

Among his many speaking engagements, he has been the keynote speaker at both a JPMorgan Chase energy conference and a Royal Bank of Canada commodities conference.

Dr. Leeb received his bachelor’s degree in Economics from the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School of Business. He then earned his master’s degree in Mathematics and Ph.D. in Psychology from the University of Illinois in just three years, an academic record that stands to date. He is frequently quoted in the financial media, including Investors Business Daily, USA Today, Business Week, The New York Times, NPR and The Wall Street Journal. In addition, Dr. Leeb is a regular guest on Fox News, Bloomberg, CNN and Neil Cavuto.

Analyst Articles

The Fed used to write the market letter. Now cause and effect have switched places. The “tape” is what counts, and it will determine what the Fed does, even forcing it to accept conditions, such as high inflation, it finds loathsome. We discuss some of the reasons… Read More

The relative weakness in oil and most other commodities is good news for the market, suggesting it isn’t headed for a full-fledged crash. Of course, we’re also counting on the Fed behaving rationally, i.e., avoiding actions that in today’s environment would bring on an economic apocalypse. Read More

Barring a massive discovery of critical commodities – copper, oil, zinc, etc. – or the emergence of some miraculous technology that makes these commodities unnecessary, the market will likely continue to follow the course that we’ve laid out since late 2021. Stocks will remain intensely volatile,… Read More

Oil is the only commodity whose ups and downs can make or break economies and markets. It’s no accident that the recent stock market rally began at the end of 2022 when oil hit a 12-month low. Or that the bear market that began in early 2022 came as oil… Read More

Money isn’t everything” is a maxim that investors should heed. Why? Because it turns out that money, and the growing obses­sion with it on a multitude of levels, can backfire – including when it comes to corporate performance. It’s no secret that the gap between the very rich and everyone… Read More

Not so long ago, a Fed fighting inflation translated into lower oil prices. For much of last year that was the case, as oil corrected enough to suggest that – based on oil’s historical relationship to stocks – a new bull market was around the corner. But just as we… Read More