Jon Markman provides investment commentary in his Strategic Advantage and Trader's Advantage services.. A pioneer in the development of stock-rating systems and screening software, Markman is co-inventor on two Microsoft patents and author of the best-selling books "Swing Trading" and "Online Investing." He was portfolio manager and senior investment strategist at a multi-strategy hedge fund from 2002 to 2005; managing editor and columnist at CNBC on MSN Money from 1997 to 2002 and an editor, investments columnist and investigative reporter at the Los Angeles Times from 1984 to 1997.

Markman won a Gerald Loeb Award for Distinguished Financial Journalism for his columns explaining market chicanery in 2002; Society of Professional Journalists awards for his 2001 reporting on Enron and the post-Sept. 11-investment environment; and was a news editor on Los Angeles Times staffs that won Pulitzer Prizes for spot-news reporting in 1992 and 1994. A graduate of Duke University and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, he speaks frequently on investment topics at conferences nationwide as well as on TV and radio.