Henry Blodget

Last updated

Henry Blodget
Henry Blodget (Business Insider).jpg
Blodget in 2012
Born
Henry McKelvey Blodget

1966 (age 57–58)
Education Yale University (BA)
Occupation(s)Businessman
Investor
Journalist
Known forFormer securities analyst at Merrill Lynch during dot-com bubble charged with civil securities fraud

Henry McKelvey Blodget (born 1966) is an American businessman, investor and journalist. He is notable for his former career as an equity research analyst who was senior Internet analyst for CIBC Oppenheimer and the head of the global Internet research team at Merrill Lynch during the dot-com era. [1] Blodget was charged with civil securities fraud by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission [2] and settled the charges. [3] Blodget is the co-founder and former CEO of Business Insider . [4]

Contents

Early life and education

Blodget was born and raised on Manhattan's Upper East Side, the son of a commercial banker. He attended Phillips Exeter Academy and received a Bachelor of Arts degree in history from Yale University, where he was a member of The Society of Orpheus and Bacchus.

After college, he taught English in Japan, then moved to San Francisco to be a writer while supporting himself by giving tennis lessons. He was also a freelance journalist and a proofreader for Harper's Magazine . [1]

Investment career

In 1994, Blodget joined the corporate finance training program at Prudential Securities, and, two years later, moved to Oppenheimer & Co. in equity research. In October 1998, he predicted that the common stock of Amazon (Nasdaq: AMZN) then trading at $240, would be priced at $400 within a year. This was thought highly unlikely at the time; however, just three weeks later Amazon's stock price passed that mark, a gain of 67%. [5] This call received significant media attention. Two months later, Blodget accepted a position at Merrill Lynch, and frequently appeared on CNBC and similar shows. [5] [6]

In early 2000, days before the dot-com bubble burst, Blodget personally invested $700,000 in tech stocks, only to lose most of it in the years that followed. [7] He accepted a buyout offer from Merrill Lynch and left the firm in 2001. [1] Subsequently, he was charged with civil securities fraud regarding actions taken while at Merrill Lynch. [8]

Fraud allegation and settlement

In 2003, Blodget was charged with civil securities fraud by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. [8] and settled the charges with a payment of $4 million without admitting or denying the allegations and their underlying facts and findings. He was permanently barred from the securities industry and by the SEC, NASD, and NYSE. [9]

The charges arose from actions Blodget took from 1999-2001 while at Merrill Lynch, which included issuing materially misleading research reports on internet companies, and making exaggerated or unwarranted claims about them to customers.

Writing

Following his departure from the financial markets, Blodget resumed his career as a financial and economics writer. He was appointed CEO of Cherry Hill Research, a research and consulting firm, and contributed to Slate , Newsweek International, The New York Times , Fortune , Forbes Online, Business 2.0 , Euromoney , New York magazine, and The Financial Times .

Blodget rose to prominence again as co-founder, CEO, and editor-in-chief of Business Insider (initially known as Silicon Alley Insider) in 2007. He was also a frequent contributor to the Seeking Alpha website at the same time. [10] While CEO and owner of Business Insider, he offered free reproduction of all content to readers under Creative Commons licensing. In 2014, Jeffrey Bezos purchased a stake in Business Insider.

In November 2023, it was reported that Blodget would no longer be the CEO of Business Insider. [11] He no longer contributes articles to Slate, Newsweek, and New York magazine. Blodget's articles focus on the return-limiting actions of individual investors, including listening to analysts and the financial media, and relying on active management such as mutual and hedge funds. His Slate articles about investing carry a seven-paragraph disclosure of potential conflicts of interest. [7]

In January 2007, Blodget published The Wall Street Self-Defense Manual: A Consumer's Guide to Intelligent Investing. [12]

Internet broadcaster

Blodget used to co-host the Daily-Ticker [13] broadcast with Aaron Task weekdays at Yahoo! Finance.

Bibliography

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Insider trading</span> Public company stock or securities trading using nonpublic information

Insider trading is the trading of a public company's stock or other securities based on material, nonpublic information about the company. In various countries, some kinds of trading based on insider information are illegal. This is because it is seen as unfair to other investors who do not have access to the information, as the investor with insider information could potentially make larger profits than a typical investor could make. The rules governing insider trading are complex and vary significantly from country to country. The extent of enforcement also varies from one country to another. The definition of insider in one jurisdiction can be broad and may cover not only insiders themselves but also any persons related to them, such as brokers, associates, and even family members. A person who becomes aware of non-public information and trades on that basis may be guilty of a crime.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Fidelity Investments</span> American multinational financial services corporation

Fidelity Investments, formerly known as Fidelity Management & Research (FMR), is an American multinational financial services corporation based in Boston, Massachusetts. Established in 1946, the company is one of the largest asset managers in the world, with $4.9 trillion in assets under management, and, as of December 2023, $12.6 trillion in assets under administration. Fidelity Investments operates a brokerage firm, manages a large family of mutual funds, provides fund distribution and investment advice, retirement services, index funds, wealth management, securities execution and clearance, asset custody, and life insurance.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Merrill Lynch & Co.</span> Defunct American investment bank

Merrill Lynch & Co., formally Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner & Smith Incorporated, was a publicly-traded American investment bank that existed independently from 1914 until January 2009 before being acquired by Bank of America and rolled into BofA Securities.

The trial of Kenneth Lay, former chairman and CEO of Enron, and Jeffrey Skilling, former CEO and COO, was presided over by federal district court Judge Sim Lake in the Southern District of Texas in 2006 in response to the Enron scandal.

SEC Rule 10b5-1, codified at 17 CFR 240.10b5-1, is a regulation enacted by the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in 2000. The SEC states that Rule 10b5-1 was enacted in order to resolve an unsettled issue over the definition of insider trading, which is prohibited by SEC Rule 10b-5.

First Command Financial Planning, Inc. is a broker-dealer registered with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA), all 50 states, and the District of Columbia. It is a member of the Securities Investor Protection Corporation (SIPC).

Jacob (Jake) H. Zamansky is an American securities arbitration attorney.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Anthony Elgindy</span>

Anthony Elgindy, was an American stock broker, and financial commentator who founded Pacific Equity Investigations. Elgindy gained a reputation for his "investigations" of companies. Towards the end of his life, Elgindy was convicted of insider trading and served seven years in federal prison.

The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) is a private American corporation that acts as a self-regulatory organization (SRO) that regulates member brokerage firms and exchange markets. FINRA is the successor to the National Association of Securities Dealers, Inc. (NASD) as well as to the member regulation, enforcement, and arbitration operations of the New York Stock Exchange. The U.S. government agency that acts as the ultimate regulator of the U.S. securities industry, including FINRA, is the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

The Reebok insider trading case was an insider trading scheme that took place in 2004 and 2005 and involved tips from a Merrill Lynch investment banker, confidential information from Business Week and a grand juror, and trades by individuals in both the United States and Europe. The trades were largely orchestrated by David Pajčin, an ex-Goldman Sachs trader who was subsequently ordered to pay nearly $28 million in fines and judgments by the SEC.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ken Lewis (executive)</span> Former CEO, president, and chairman of Bank of America

Kenneth D. Lewis is the former CEO, president, and chairman of Bank of America, the second largest bank in the United States and twelfth largest by total assets in the world. While CEO of Bank of America, Lewis was noted for purchasing the failing companies Countrywide Financial and Merrill Lynch, resulting in large losses for the bank and necessitating financial assistance from the federal government. On September 30, 2009, Bank of America confirmed that Lewis would be retiring by the end of the year. Lewis was replaced by Brian Moynihan as president and CEO and Walter Massey as chairman of the board.

Heather Miller is an American businesswoman. She is a private investor, former Wall Street securities analyst. She served as a Congressional appointed commissioner on the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission in 2009 and the President's Commission on Enhancing National Cybersecurity in 2016.

Business Insider is a New York City–based multinational financial and business news website founded in 2007. Since 2015, a majority stake in Business Insider's parent company Insider Inc. has been owned by the German publishing house Axel Springer. It operates several international editions, including one in the United Kingdom.

Zachery "Zach" Kouwe is a communications strategist and former financial journalist. He is known for serving as a media and strategic communications advisor to corporations and financial firms including activist shareholders and institutional investors and has worked as an advisor for the corporate whistleblower attorney Jordan A. Thomas.

Murray Frank LLP is a law firm based in New York City that specializes in class action litigation, particularly in cases involving federal securities law, federal antitrust law, ERISA, and state consumer protection law.

Merrill, previously branded Merrill Lynch, is an American investment management and wealth management division of Bank of America. Along with BofA Securities, the investment banking arm, both firms engage in prime brokerage and broker-dealer activities. The firm is headquartered in New York City, and once occupied the entire 34 stories of 250 Vesey Street, part of the Brookfield Place complex in Manhattan. Merrill employs over 14,000 financial advisors and manages $2.8 trillion in client assets. The company also operates Merrill Edge, a division for investment and related services, including call center counsultancy.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Danny Porush</span> American businessman

Daniel Mark Porush is an American businessman, former stock broker and convicted criminal who helped run a pump and dump stock fraud scheme in the 1990s at the Stratton Oakmont brokerage in collaboration with Jordan Belfort. In 1999, he was convicted of securities fraud and money laundering, for which he served 39 months in prison. After prison, Porush became involved with a Florida-based medical supply company, Med-Care, which was the subject of federal investigations. In the biographical 2013 film The Wolf of Wall Street, which focuses on the story of Belfort and Stratton Oakmont, Jonah Hill portrays Donnie Azoff, a character loosely based on Porush. Porush has called the portrayal inaccurate and threatened to sue the filmmakers to prevent him from being depicted.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Leerink Partners</span> U.S. investment bank

Leerink Partners LLC is an independent investment bank providing healthcare companies and investors with financial services including M&A advisory, equity and debt capital markets, proprietary research, and sales and trading capabilities. The firm was founded in 1995 by Jeffrey A. Leerink, and is headquartered in Boston, with offices in New York City, San Francisco, Charlotte, and Nashville.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Insider Inc.</span> American online media company

Insider Inc. is an American online media company known for publishing Business Insider and other media websites. It is a subsidiary of the German publisher Axel Springer SE, the largest in Europe.

References

  1. 1 2 3 McGeehan, Patrick (November 15, 2001). "Henry Blodget to Leave Merrill Lynch". The New York Times.
  2. ↑ Factual allegations as submitted by SEC
  3. ↑ https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2013/04/08/business-outsider "Business Outsider," New Yorker magazine April 1, 2013
  4. ↑ "Business Insider grew in 12 years to a monster digital enterprise. Now CEO Henry Blodget has plotted a new wave of expansion". Poynter. January 15, 2020. Retrieved September 2, 2020.
  5. 1 2 "The Rehabilitation of Henry Blodget". The Motley Fool. November 24, 2004. Retrieved January 30, 2007.
  6. ↑ "Report Card:Henry Blodget". TheStreet.com. Archived from the original on December 5, 2006. Retrieved January 30, 2007.
  7. 1 2 "The Wall Street Self-Defense Manual, Part 4" by Blodget, with sidebar
  8. 1 2 Factual allegations as submitted by SEC
  9. ↑ "The Securities and Exchange Commission, NASD and the New York Stock Exchange Permanently Bar Henry Blodget From the Securities Industry and Require $4 Million Payment". SEC. Retrieved April 21, 2007.
  10. ↑ "Home". Silicon Alley Insider. Retrieved July 6, 2015.
  11. ↑ Bruell, Alexandra (November 14, 2023). "Insider Co-Founder Henry Blodget Steps Down as CEO Amid Strategy Shift". Wall Street Journal.
  12. ↑ III, Harry Hurt (February 18, 2007). "Financial Advice From 'That Henry Blodget'". The New York Times. ISSN   0362-4331 . Retrieved September 2, 2020.
  13. ↑ "Yahoo Daily Ticker".

Further reading

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.