Editor, Stansberry Research
Whitney Tilson is Editor of Stansberry Research, which provides advice, commentary and in-depth research and analysis to help people become better investors. The business has more than 100,000 paid subscribers.
In the year prior to joining Stansberry in 2018, he founded and ran Kase Learning, through which he taught a range of investing seminars around the world and hosted two conferences dedicated solely to short selling.
He founded and, for nearly two decades, ran Kase Capital Management, which managed three value-oriented hedge funds and two mutual funds, with assets that peaked at over $200 million.
Mr. Tilson published his fourth book in 2021, The Art of Playing Defense: How to Get Ahead by Not Falling Behind. He has also co-authored two books, The Art of Value Investing: How the World’s Best Investors Beat the Market (2013) and More Mortgage Meltdown: 6 Ways to Profit in These Bad Times (2009), and was a contributor to Poor Charlie’s Almanack: The Wit and Wisdom of Charles T. Munger (2005), the definitive book on Berkshire Hathaway Vice Chairman Charlie Munger. In addition, he has written for Forbes, the Financial Times, Kiplinger’s, the Motley Fool and TheStreet.com. He was featured in two 60 Minutes segments in December 2008 about the housing crisis (which won an Emmy) and in March 2015 about Lumber Liquidators, was one of five investors included in SmartMoney’s 2006 Power 30, was named by Institutional Investor in 2007 as one of 20 Rising Stars, has appeared dozens of times on CNBC, Bloomberg TV and Fox Business Network, was on the cover of the July 2007 Kiplinger’s, has been profiled by the Wall Street Journal and the Washington Post, and has spoken widely on value investing.
Mr. Tilson spent much of his childhood in Tanzania and Nicaragua (his parents are both educators, were among the first couples to meet and marry in the Peace Corps, and have retired in Kenya). Consequently, Mr. Tilson is involved with a number of charities focused on education reform and Africa.
Regarding the former, he:
Was among the first people to join Wendy Kopp in 1989 to launch Teach For America.
Has served for more than two decades on the board of the KIPP Academy charter school in the South Bronx.
Is a board observer for Bridge International Academies, which runs more than 500 low-cost schools in Kenya, Liberia, Uganda, Nigeria and India.
Is a board member and one of the founders of Democrats for Education Reform, which aims to move the Democratic Party to embrace genuine school reform.
Is a well-known writer/blogger/commentator on education reform.
Authored a 292-slide presentation, A Right Denied: The Critical Need for Genuine School Reform, that was made into a documentary by the same name in early 2010.
Was one of the ~600 children in the famous Marshmallow Experiment in the early 1970s.
Regarding Africa, Mr. Tilson:
Served on the board of the Fistula Foundation for a decade, which supports the Hamlin Fistula Hospitals in Ethiopia and other fistula hospitals worldwide.
Was on the board of the Thorn Tree Project and the Samburu Scholarship Fund, which provide educational opportunities for nomadic children in northern Kenya.
He is also on the board of the Pershing Square Foundation, co-chairs Central Synagogue’s criminal justice reform initiative, is a member of (and, for two years, was Chairman of) the Manhattan chapter of the Young Presidents’ Organization, and served on the finance committees of Barack Obama and Cory Booker. For his philanthropic work, he received the 2008 John C. Whitehead Social Enterprise Award from the Harvard Business School Club of Greater New York.
Prior to launching his investment career in 1999, Mr. Tilson spent five years working with Harvard Business School Professor Michael E. Porter studying the competitiveness of inner cities and inner-city-based companies nationwide. He and Professor Porter founded the Initiative for a Competitive Inner City, of which Mr. Tilson was Executive Director. Mr. Tilson also led the effort to create ICV Partners, a national for-profit private equity fund focused on minority-owned and inner-city businesses that has raised nearly $500 million. Before business school, Mr. Tilson spent two years as an Associate at The Boston Consulting Group.
Mr. Tilson is an avid mountaineer – he climbed the Nose of El Capitan in June 2020 and has summited Mt. Kilimanjaro, Mt. Blanc, the Matterhorn and the Eiger. He also regularly competes in obstacle course races, including the world championships pro division. He has run the last seven 24-hour World’s Toughest Mudders, winning the 50+ age group twice and setting the all-time age-group record of 75 miles in 2016.
Mr. Tilson graduated magna cum laude from Harvard College in 1989 with a bachelor’s degree in Government and received an MBA with High Distinction from the Harvard Business School in 1994, where he was elected a Baker Scholar (top 5% of class).
He lives in Manhattan with his wife of 30 years, with whom he has three adult daughters.