What are the Best Finance Newsletters?
Financial Newsletters are the preferred option for practitioners to stay on top of the markets and be updated on current events in the digital age.
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Financial newsletters are emailed straight to your inbox each morning – either on a daily or weekly basis.
Closely following the markets is a necessity for aspiring financiers and financiers alike.
However, not everyone has enough time in the day to read every page of the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) or the Financial Times (FT).
Fortunately, financial newsletters have emerged to ensure that people with limited time – or short attention spans – can remain informed.
The newsletters in our list of recommendations are delivered straight over email to your inbox and should serve as an easy, stress-free read while eating breakfast, on transit, etc.
That said, we still recommend making it a daily habit to consistently read the WSJ or Financial Times – or at the very least, skim the front page and major headlines.
Quick Disclaimer
Before we begin, we’d like to take a moment to mention that these recommendations are subjective and merely represent suggestions on a select number of newsletters.
Our top newsletter recommendations are not necessarily listed in any particular order.
In fact, each newsletter is worth checking out, because we’ve hand-picked only the highest-quality newsletters on the market at present.
1. Axios Pro Rata | Dan Primack
Starting off our list of newsletter recommendations is the daily Pro Rata newsletter written by Dan Primack, the business editor at Axios.
Dan Primack, formerly the senior editor of Fortune’s Term Sheet, is widely considered one of the most well-known columnists in Silicon Valley and Wall Street.
Axios Pro Rata provides comprehensive deal coverage ranging from venture capital (VC), private equity (PE) and mergers & acquisitions (M&A).
2. Money Stuff (Bloomberg) | Matt Levine
The Money Stuff newsletter, authored by Matt Levine – a columnist at Bloomberg – is a widely-read publication offering insightful commentary on a broad range of topics, including corporate finance (M&A), regulatory matters in business, and the state of the economy, among others.
The sharp analytical skills and thought-provoking commentary of Levine—a former investment banker at Goldman Sachs and M&A lawyer—has garnered a dedicated following among practitioners and casual finance enthusiasts alike.
The unique writing style of Levine, which blends wit and technical knowledge of intricate subject matters, is seldom come across.
Frequently, Levine writes on the idiosyncrasies of the financial markets, such as the collapse of FTX, and challenges the consensus, a rare attribute in news media publications nowadays.
Levine manages to deconstruct technical finance and legal jargon with ease, irrespective of the complexity of the underlying concepts, which is a testament to his exceptional talent at distilling onerous financial matters to make understanding the markets and current events more accessible to the finance community.
3. Transacted | Private Equity News
Transacted, a newsletter that covers the private markets in particular, has quickly become one of the top publications in its niche since its launch in mid-2023.
The pseudonymous writer that pens the newsletter—evidently a former practitioner with experience in investment banking and/or private equity—provides insights of exceptional quality and depth, setting Transacted apart from its competitors.
Contrary to the standard curation format with minimal commentary, the Transacted newsletter structure resembles deal summaries, offering detailed yet succinct analyses of recent M&A deals, investment themes, and fundraising in the private markets.
Considering its recent growth trajectory, wherein the newsletter’s subscriber base exceeded 60k subscribers with relative ease, the Transacted media brand certainly appears to be on track to become a well-recognized name among investment professionals, especially in the private equity industry.
4. Exec Sum | Litquidity
Exec Sum is a newsletter formed by Litquidity, the anonymous financial-meme account that rose to prominence amid the pandemic and the surge in retail investing.
The newsletter strikes the right balance between curating top daily news and injecting humor – a unique approach that is evidently working, as confirmed by its growth in readership.
In particular, the direct writing approach sets the Exec Sum newsletter apart, which can be described as a compressed version of Pro Rata, i.e. a much lighter (and more entertaining) read.
The concise writing style of Exec Sum creates a more enjoyable reading experience and provides the opportunity to decompress and scroll through some memes before starting the day.
5. The Daily Upside (TDU) | Patrick Trousdale
The Daily Upside (TDU) is a newsletter founded by Patrick Trousdale, a former investment banker at Guggenheim Partners, that quickly amassed a large following (1+ million subscribers), and it’s easy to understand why.
Notably, each daily email comes designed in a compact, minimalistic format and is written in a distinct, witty tone.
In spite of its comfortable, laid-back style, the newsletter is insightful and contains engaging content on the day’s top stories, often tackling complex topics.
But each concept is broken down into easy-to-understand, “bite-sized” pieces, contrary to traditional news outlets that use unnecessary jargon or curate a list of trending news stories without real analysis.
