Susan Antilla

Susan Antilla is an award-winning journalist and columnist at TheStreet.com. She is also a contributor to The New York Times DealBook. Antilla is the author of Tales From the Boom-Boom Room: The Landmark Legal Battles That Exposed Wall Street’s Shocking Culture of Sexual Harassment (2002), an expose of sexual harassment on Wall Street in the 1990s, focusing especially upon Smith Barney. The New York Observer called the book “a work of compelling Wall Street anthropology.”
She has written about business and finance since 1978, and was author of the Sunday “Wall Street” column at The New York Times. Antilla has headed the New York Bureau of the Money section of USA Today and the financial bureau of the Baltimore Sun. She began her career as a business writer at Dun’s Business Month, and has written for Bloomberg View, New York magazine, The Motley Fool, CNN.com, thestreet.com, Investopedia and The Scotsman. She has a master's degree in journalism from New York University.
Antilla was formerly an adjunct professor in the graduate journalism department of New York University and an adjunct professor of journalism at Fairfield University.

Professional recognition

In 2016, Antilla won the “Best in Business” award in the commentary category from the Society of American Business Editors and Writers (SABEW). The judges called her columns “a reality check about the institutional forces working against the interests of small investors.”

The New York Press Club gave her its award for consumer reporting in 2016 for her stories about problems with online security at the mutual fund company The Vanguard Group – the same stories that the Connecticut Press Club chose for first place in business journalism in 2016 and the National Federation of Press Women chose for its 2016 Communications Award.

For her columns at TheStreet.com, she also received the 2016 Excellence in Journalism awards from The Society of the Silurians; the 2016 Excellence in Journalism Award from the New York State Society of CPAs; first place for commentary from the American Society of Business Publication Editors (ASBPE); and second place for online commentary In 2016 from the National Society of Newspaper Columnists.

In 2015, she won first place in the American Society of Business Press Editors (ASBPE) Awards of Excellence for original web commentary for her columns at TheStreet.com. The Society of the Silurians gave her its Excellence in Journalism award for her columns at TheStreet in 2015. She won first prize in the at-large competition in two categories in the National Federation of Press Women’s 2015 competition – one for her New York Times article about sex discrimination at Sterling Jewelers, and the other for her columns about financial abuse of the elderly published by TheStreet.

She received the SABEW “Best in Business” award for online commentary in 2014 for her work at Bloomberg View. Antilla received the “Excellence in Journalism” award for business and financial reporting from The Society of the Silurians in 2014, and first prize in the Personal Opinion category from the Connecticut Press Club.

In 2013, she was winner in the news agency category in the SABEW "Best In Business" competition (Commentary), for her work at Bloomberg View. The award page describes her writing as "crisp and eviscerating" and says that she demonstrates "a shrewd understanding of the financial industry and its unsteady interaction with the federal government." In 2013 she also received the "Excellence in Journalism" award from The Society of The Silurians, the "Excellence in Journalism" award from The New York State Society of CPAs and "First Prize for Personal Opinion Columns" from The Connecticut Press Club.

Antilla received the 2012 “Excellence in Journalism” award for online commentary from The Society of the Silurians. The Connecticut Press Club selected her for “Best Book of the Year” in 2002, and as a finalist for column writing in 2012.

National Federation of Press Women 2003 winner in non-fiction book category for Tales From The Boom-Boom Room.

She received the “Excellence in Financial Journalism” award from the New York State Society of Certified Public Accountants in 1996, and the “Women’s Leadership Award” from Manhattanville College. She has twice been a finalist for the prestigious Gerald Loeb awards for financial journalism, in 1997 and 1998.

Career Timeline

1978 to 1982: Reporter at Dun’s Business Month
1982 to 1985: Stock market reporter, USA Today
1985 to 1986: Financial bureau chief, The Baltimore Sun
1986 to 1992: Money section bureau chief and columnist, USA Today
1992 to 1995: Reporter and columnist, The New York Times
1995 to 2013: Columnist, Bloomberg News and Bloomberg View
2014: Columnist, TheStreet.com.

In 1994, she became the focus of controversy when she wrote an article for the New York Times that repeated false rumors suggesting Presstek Inc. CEO Robert Howard was really a convicted felon named Howard Finkelstein. The Times published an apology, and in 2000 Antilla was eventually ordered to pay damages of $480,000 to Howard. The court judgment was reversed in 2002. In 1997, Howard and Presstek were fined $2.9 million by the SEC for distributing false information to investors.

Works

• Susan Antilla (2003). Tales from the Boom-Boom Room. New York: HarperBusiness. ISBN 0-06-056545-4.