Author/Editor
Stephen Leeb
Publisher
Investing Daily
Description
Edited by Dr. Stephen Leeb, this is his “go anywhere” monthly newsletter (previously published by Leeb Investing).
Overall Rating
Rating: 3.5/5. From 36 votes.
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3.9
Rating from 170 votes
If you’ve subscribed to Complete Investor, The, please click the stars below to indicate your rating for this newsletter, and please share any other feedback about your experience using the comment box below.
Investment Performance
Rating from 46 votes
Rating: 3.9/5. From 46 votes.
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Quality Of Writing/Analysis
Rating from 45 votes
Rating: 4.0/5. From 45 votes.
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Value For Price
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Rating: 4.2/5. From 43 votes.
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Customer Service
Rating from 36 votes
Rating: 3.5/5. From 36 votes.
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My two year subscription is about up and I won’t be renewing.
Like alot of people I became aware of Leeb through some radio interviews and his book, “Oil Factor”. About two years ago, he sounded like a sage and I could see where he was going, agreed with many of his picks, and his rationale for doing so. His strategy seemed, well, pretty smart. And then he completely ignored his own “oil factor” and lost a bundle for his subscribers! I agree with JohnnyHeck, what was the guy thinking? He could have come through this with a diamond reputation would he have made the call to sell based on the “factor”. In fact the only four star rating I gave to this service was for customer service. I sent an email to him asking if his strategy was flawed. I didn’t expect a reply but did get one within 48 hours with the statement that this was a “different kind of market” (at the time everything across the board was going down, including his GOLD picks).
I too, am tired of all his emails promising the next big thing. I think I can figure that out on my own now!
I have been a long time subscriber and have followed Leeb’s advice religiously but I am down over 50% from my initial investment. I opted for a change and cancelled my account in May 09 expecting a refund. Customer service Steffany Bowes agreed to refund in 4-5 bussines days but I’m still waitng 6 weeks for the refund and they won’t respond to questions. I’d stay away from these folks……worst customer service I’ve seen in a long time. Leeb’s OK but his customer service is the pits.
I subscribed to the Complete Investor after reading the Oil Factor and thinking that it was terrific. In the Oil Factor Leeb gives a formula for when to be in the market based on the price of oil over the last 12 months. I think it was something like if oil is up over 80% in last 12 months get out of the market and stay out until oil up no more than 20% in last 12 months.
The problem is that when the Oil Factor gave the sell signal Leeb told his investors to stay in the market becuase he was a “nimble” prognosticator and the market was fine. Alas, if he had followed his own formula his readers would have been mostly on the sidelines during the 2008 crash. Like many other reviewers, I lost faith when that happened.
On the plus side I like Leeb’s macro view and his stock picks are solid blue chips with exposure to energy, gold or international exposure. He was proven to be right in the Oil Factor, although that was two books ago and he changes his formula every couple of years. On the down side Leeb wrongly touts himself as a world-class market timer and did not follow his own advice that he devoted an entire book to. It makes it hard to trust the guy.
Read the Oil Factor and consider applying it to your portfolio. Don’t buy into Leeb’s over-blown self promotion as a short term stock picker.
I have subscribed to Leeb’s publications for many years off and on. He is very long term and you need to pick and choose from his list. I use his ideas and philosophy and then compare with some other newletters I subscribe to. Over all good reading but picks are to long out in developing.
In Feb. ’09 I received a mailing from TCI that proclaimed “There will be no depression”. Inside was material that was decidedly bullish on the stock market, stating that an important low soon would be reached. This agreed with my own opinion so I subscribed for $80 online, believing that my report on the “8 stocks to buy in 2009” would arrive in “5 minutes” as the ad claimed.
It took several days and phone calls before I could even log on to Leeb’s website. I was placed in e-mail contact with an employee who admitted to me that the “8 stocks” report did not exist yet. Meanwhile, I read back issues on the web site to see how well Leeb had protected his subscribers during 2008. I could find no warnings, no big SELL signals, nothing like that at all. As far as I could tell he had remained fully invested or nearly so for the crash of 2008.
Finally, after about 6 weeks and several emails, I received the “8 stocks” report. By this time Leeb seemed to have done a 180 and was now proclaiming that an even bigger crash was coming within months. I guess this meant that I was to wait on purchasing the 8 best stocks for 2009? In March several of my own indicators signalled Buy and I did so. By late April it seemed pretty obvious that the market had bottomed in March. Never a word from Leeb about that possibilty, throughout March and April he had been rather bearish. I was so confused and fed up that I cancelled my subscription and did receive a prompt refund. I will say that much for the service.
Just for fun, I made a paper portfolio of the 8 best stocks with equal weights of each. (Actually there were 9 stocks. The last 2 seemed to be paired so I allocated 1/16 to each of these, and 1/8 to each of the first 7.) I assumed purchase of all of these at the close of March 9, the day of the low. For comparison I “purchased” the same amount of the Russell 2000 ETF (symbol IWM) at the same time.
The market may indeed crash to new lows, no one can know for sure about that. However, the popular averages have all advanced 40% to 50% off the March low. That may not be a bull market in everyone’s book, but it is a large enough move that any adviser worth paying for should have made some money on it.
I honestly do not know whether or not Leeb intended that I should have bought his best stocks for 2009. But from Mar. 9 to the close on July 31, IWM was almost 16% ahead of the paper portfolio of them which I had created.
If you think that it is easy or even likely for a newsletter writer to beat a buy and hold strategy of an index like the Russell 2000 over time, I suggest that you look at the results of Mark Hulbert’s studies since about 1980.
I had subscribed to the Complete Investor for many years. During that time Leeb had sent, by e-mail, advice and market information 2 or 3 times weekly. However, when the market meltdown occurred in late 2008-2009, he seemed to have disappeared. At the time when we needed guidance the most, he was scarce as hen’s teeth. Because of his neglect I did not renew my subscription. Some of his recos like Novagold & GE were portfolio killers. And, too, his constant barrage trying to sell his other advice letters had become very irritating.
I just wonder if his prediction of $200 oil will ever materialize (during our lifetimes).
I wish him luck, but I will not be donating any more of my money to his vast fortune.
A lot of valuable informations in a well written and relatively cheap newsletter.
But you need to do your own technical analysis before buying or selling…(Leeb and his team aren’t very good “short term stock pickers”!)
I’ve subscribed to The Complete Investor from roughly early in 2007 to date (late 2009), paying $79 per year for most periods. What appealed to me initially was Stephen Leeb’s view of the global macroeconomy – largely founded on his outlook that the two primary factors determining which investments will be profitable in the years ahead are energy shortages (Dr. Leeb ascribes to the Peak Oil theory) and the rise of foreign/emerging markets, especially Brazil, Russia, China and India (though over the years this has shifted to Brazil, Russia, Australia, and China). I still think he has the macroeconomic trends pegged pretty well, and his recommended portfolio is an assembly stocks in stable companies that stand to profit from the trends he projects. That said, some of the critiques here raised by others are valid; especially disappointing has been Dr. Leeb’s guidance during the extreme bear market of 2008/early 2009, when he advised holding all positions till nearly the end of the crash, all the while affirming that the financial crisis was just a short downturn and that inflation was bound to come roaring because of the bailouts from governments and central banks. Long term, that’s still a strong possibility, but holding that expectation to be imminent in early 2009 was a portfolio killer.
In short – I think most, but not all, of Dr. Leeb’s recommendations are good ones for long-term holdings, and you can rest easy that if he recommends a stock the underlying company is very likely to have a solid balance sheet and steady revenue stream. I think he gets too attached though to his expectations regarding coming trends in the global economy, so when the facts go against him he’s too slow to shift his holdings.
Regarding ads for other newsletters – yes, I get several emailed ads per week, though never any snail-mail ads. They’re usually easy to identify by the sort of wording in the subject line, and I usually delete them. I’m not disappointed by the ads; most newsletter writers are partly in the business of analyzing investments, and partly in the business of selling newsletters, so advertising comes with the territory.
A reader could do far worse with some other newsletters than with The Complete Investor. S/he could do at least a little better with yet different, well-chosen alternatives in the same general price range. If you do choose to subscribe to The Complete Investor, despite any advice Dr. Leeb may offer regarding holding on to declining investment, definitely use 25% trailing stops; when a storm hits, these will help you cut your losses short.
My 1 year subscription just ended and I will NOT be renewing. My biggest disappointment with TCI is the short term indicator. This indicator went negative on or about 3/6/09 just at the market low. It has stayed negative through a 7 month 60% bull market rally. What a bad joke.
Stephen Leeb is a perfect market timer. In beginning of 2008,
he recommended financial and home builder stocks, most of
which lost 80-90% value during the meltdown. Now, he is
recommending gold, oil and other commodities. I guess it is
time to short commodities. He has short positions in fast
track portfolio. Most of his short positions have increased
in value, thereby losing subscribers money. The only way
yo make money using this newsletter is to go long on his
short positions and go short on this long positions. Consistency
wise, I give him 5 stars, he is 100% wrong all the time.
I have subscribed to TCI since Leeb started this newsletter after leaving Personal Finance. Like some of the other reviewers, I would say I get more value from his commentary than from his stock picks. Of the portfolios in the newsletter, I find the small cap value and the mutual fund portfolios the least useful. The mutual funds seem to change without much reasoning and are not covered nearly as extensively as his economic outlook or the individual stocks. The small cap value picks do not seem to be particularly inspired or to have done very well, even accounting for a poor market since that portfolio’s inception. The growth and income portfolios have done better (at least by my accounting), but like most (all?) newsletters, you really need to buy into most or all of the picks in a portfolio to really follow it – if you cherry pick, you are just as likely to get a loser as a winner unless you are a better stock picker than Leeb. I use the newsletter mainly to give me things to think about in terms of asset allocation and economic outlook and have only bought a handful of the picks (did I just violate my previously stated rule? Oh well). If Leeb has been pounding the table for something, like commodities and precious metals (as he has for years now), I consider closely his arguments and that informs my own personal portfolio construction. If I were a subscriber really interested using many of his picks, I would first buy the larger, more solid companies he recommends. He seems to have a spotty record when he tries to pick a small cap stock as a potential home run (for example, he was bullish on Apex Silver for years, and though he did not ride it into bankruptcy, he rode it way down). If you want to see how he manages money on his own in a way pretty similar to the TCI growth portfolio strategy, look at his mutual fund: Leeb Focus Fund (LCMFX). It has not been a standout, but it has beaten the S&P 500 since its late 2006 inception, according to Morningstar. I subscribe to a number of newsletters and almost did not renew my subscription to TCI this last time, but decided to give it one more year. We shall see. One final note: I, like many reviewers, find the number of different newsletters Leeb sponsors, and for which I am always receiving touts, annoying. If Leeb has so many other good stock ideas, why are they not in a publication called “The Complete Investor” – perhaps he should rename it “The Partial Investor.”
“……worst customer service I’ve seen in a long time. Leeb’s OK but his customer service is the pits.”
I concur with the writer of this review. When I extended my subscription in March ’09, my email updates and alerts stopped. I’ve contacted them five times by email, phone, and written correspondence. It’s now December ’09, and the problem remains. Only after the 3rd or 4th contact did I receive the materials that had been offered (as a bribe?) with the solicitation for the extension. Amazingly incompetent. Or just crooks. I dunno which.
I subscribed to this newsletter when it started in 2005 [appx] and have been pleased with the overall view and with the discussions of various stocks.
What was a terrible failure was to NOT give a sell signal during the summer of 2008 at all.
If you are going to claim to be a market timing guru you need to say when to get out, in a timely fashion.
Leeb failed to give a sell signal in the summer of 2008- Springer in Income Performance at least said go to 50% cash- Sept of 08 so he is the better timer
I subscribed to the Complete Investor for about a year as a ‘Charter member’, but dropped my subscription because I was annoyed at the relentless marketing of additional Leeb products. If it weren’t for that, I might have kept the subscription.
For a very reasonable price at the time — less than $99 a year, I got an interesting read every month. Today, with internet access, I can get financial entertainment from the web, so it’s less valuable for that purpose than it used to be.
He published the performance of every single newsletter recommendation in each issue from the buy price until the sell price. The service offered a large number of portfolios, and each one got space in each issue. Each one’s performance was tracked. At the time, he was doing OK by his readers, although I wouldn’t say he was shooting out the lights. I never bought many of his recommendations even though the investment theses seemed good; by the the time I got the newsletter, the stocks had already run up. I had to ask myself why I was paying for advice I couldn’t use (and killing a rainforest a year in mail spam from Leeb’s publisher). I was not a subscriber during the crash or the rebound so I can’t comment on his market timing skills.
Dr Leeb appears on http://www.seekingalpha.com occasionally. My suggestion is to look for his articles there if you are interested in what he has to say.
I have been a subscriber to THE COMPLETE INVESTOR since it started and to PERSONAL FINANCE before that. I that Leeb is an intelligent huckster – witness his neverending new newsletter and self-aggrandizing pronouncements. However, I think that his basic Growth Portfolio is a good one for somewhat aggresive investors and that his Income Portfolio bears cherry picking. His Fund Finds are also worthwhile. His long-term bullishsness on commodities and energy is, I think, valid. As for his other portfolios (especially small-cap value), forget it! Market timing is not his thing, so follow him for buy-and-ho;d only!
I cancelled my subscription July 15th and received an acknowlegement the same day. None of the promised items were ever received and zero information as to investment information as promised. Several calls to customer service and many emails to no avail. All I received is it is in the system. I can see by the reviews that this is an ongoing problem with Mr. Leeb. Guess we can kiss our money goodbye.
I read it for info and decide what to invest in. So far in ’10 I’ve returned 140%. Maybe I’m just lucky with my picks (2 gold stocks)… We’ll see next year. Gold situation has changed somewhat, wonder what he’ll say about gold’s next phase- that *mild inflation is expected and only in 2 or 3 years. That the euro and yen is in trouble so US$ may not devalue that much and may be safe haven too. He is long term and I’m a trader/ shorter term.
Pros: Leeb provides very insightful “Big Picture” analysis and market commentary, along with coverage of current and future investment trends (his books are also very good, by the way.) Relatively inexpensive subscription rate.
Cons: unreported track record (perhaps Hulbert covers TCI.) Too much portfolio turnover. Too many portfolio holdings – why not simply buy sector ETFs instead? Too many “stock story” write-ups and not enough comparative data analysis of a given recommendation’s position within its industry, and with respect to its competitors. The Small-Cap Value Portfolio is particularly atrocious: NovaGold was recommended at $18 in late 2007, then plunged to $1 over the next year – you would have suffered a 94% drawdown in the position. Mediocre Editorial Staff. Known bad customer service and fulfillment.
Conclusion: allowing my subscription to end after several years. Will catch Leeb on Seeking Alpha and check out his future books from the library.
I found Leeb’s service to be junk. It’s basically a way for him to get your email address and then spam you with all sorts of other crap that he markets. Not only that, but he sells your name and address information to other investment newsletter services. I’d say read his books and skip this one. I now route everything from Leeb straight to my spam folder.