Meredith Ann Whitney (born November 20, 1969) is an American businesswoman hailed as “The Oracle of Wall Street” by Bloomberg. She is known for successfully forecasting the difficulties of Citigroup and other major banks during the financial crisis of 2007–2008.
Whitney grew up in Bethesda, Maryland. She graduated from Madeira School in 1987 before attending a post-graduate year at Lawrenceville School, becoming a member of its first co-ed graduating class. She graduated with honors from Brown University in 1992 with a B.A. in History.
Whitney joined Oppenheimer Holdings in 1993 as a Director, and in 1995 she joined the company's Specialty Finance Group. In 1998, she left Oppenheimer to become an Executive Director at Wachovia. Whitney returned to Oppenheimer in 2004, where she researched banks and brokers as a Managing Director. She resigned from Oppenheimer on February 19, 2009 to establish her own firm, Meredith Whitney Advisory Group (MWAG), where she produced company-specific equity research on financial institutions and analyzed the sector's operating environment.