NAOI President, Leland Hevner, is a leading figure in the world of investor education, investing research and financial consulting. He founded the National Association of Online Investors (NAOI) in 1997 with the mission of empowering individuals to become confident and successful investors via comprehensive, objective and actionable education combined with the use of online resources.

Thousands of people have taken NAOI online courses, read Hevner’s published books and/or attended his college classes on personal investing. His profile, accomplishments and experience are presented on this page.

naoi president, Leland b. hevner

naoi president, Leland b. hevner

Founder / President of the NAOI

Taking early retirement from a successful business career in 1992, Hevner became a full-time investor. These were the "wild west" days of personal investing when all of a sudden individuals had the power to trade stocks from their home computer. While Hevner achieved a degree of success with his online trading activities, he saw that many individuals, tempted by the siren call of day-trading riches, were losing money hand over fist.  He also saw that that financial literacy and investing, both critical life-skills, were not being taught with any degree of rigor at any level of academia.

To fix this problem Hevner founded the NAOI in 1997 to provide the comprehensive, objective and academically rigorous education that people need to become confident and successful investors. Currently the NAOI is the market’s leader in providing comprehensive, unbiased investing education to the public.

Educator

Since 2001 Hevner has taught college courses on the art and science of personal investing in the Washington D.C. area. His classes are always filled to capacity and student reviews are consistently outstanding. While he teaches the public, they also teach him. As a result Hevner has an unmatched knowledge of how individuals view the market, how they make investing decisions and how they select advisors to work with. He then uses this knowledge to revise the content of NAOI investing courses to better meet their wants and needs. He also makes this highly valuable knowledge available to financial advisors and financial organizations via consulting agreements. This information is critical to enabling investment developers and sellers to create and offer products that the public will buy. 

A Prolific Writer

In addition to teaching investing in the classroom, Hevner also teaches this topic via multiple books that he has written and published. Following is just a sampling of the books he has authored. These specific volumes are a part of the NAOI Individual Certification Program described just below. each book consists of approximately 150 pages and, in addition to education material, contains Web links that enable readers to expand their knowledge of specific topics but also to take action based on what they learn. This link to Web resources makes NAOI books far more valuable than the hundreds of financial “education” offerings found on book shelves today. For example, the “Investing Basics and Creating Your Unique Plan” book shown at upper left in the image below connects to Financial Planning Calculators found at this link on the NAOI site: www.naoi.org/calchome.

Creator of the NAOI "Individual Investor Certification Program" ™

To meet his goal of empowering individuals to take more personal control of their portfolios, Hevner created the “NAOI Individual Investor Certification Program”, the gold-standard for investor education.

The Certification Program, consists of the courses shown above covering a full range of investing topics, It also connects students to an online testing module where they can confirm that they understand what they have read. Only after correctly completing approximately 500 questions in the testing module do they earn the NAOI Individual Investor Certification diploma shown at left.

More information related to this offering is found on the NAOI Certification Program page of this Web site. This is the education program that should be offered in every high school and college in America but is not.

Author of The Perfect Portfolio Book

As mentioned above, Hevner is the author of over a dozen investor education books. One of the most popular is The Perfect Portfolio , shown at right, that was published by John Wiley & Sons, This book details a new and uniquely effective approach to portfolio design and management that can be used by individuals of all experience levels to take more personal control of their investments and to profit in virtually any market condition.

More than simply a book, The Perfect Portfolio is a multi-media publication that closely resembles a college course in investing. Withing the book’s content are Web links enable readers to take action using the knowledge they gain in the book. This gives readers a uniquely innovative and immersive learning experience.

Thousands of individuals have read this book.

Investment Researcher and Innovator

When the market crashed in 2008-2009 Hevner realized that more than education was required to empower individuals to invest with confidence, also needed was innovation. Teaching decades-old investing methods in the form of Modern Portfolio Theory (MPT) was not giving individuals the tools they needed to meet the challenges of modern markets.

With this realization, Hevner directed the NAOI Research and Development Division to search for an alternative to, or a supplement for, MPT. Needed was a new approach to investing that could not only better cope with today’s volatile markets, but also better meet the wants and needs of investors. Following a multi-year effort the NAOI found the approach needed in the form of Dynamic Investment Theory (DIT) and the innovative investment type it creates called Dynamic Investments.

Dynamic Investment Theory and Dynamic Investments will be introduced to the market via an NAOI Research Report shown nearby. For more information related to this new approach to investing click the nearby cover image.

Hevner currently teaches this new approach, in addition to MPT, to his students. They tell him that this is finally the approach to investing that will enable them to enter the market with confidence and without fear. And they will search for advisors that offer it.

Nationally Recognized Advocate for the Individual Investor

The national media has recognized Hevner’s status as an expert at understanding the the psychology of the investing public and what they want and need from advisors in order to enter the market with confidence, with success and without fear. His strong advocacy for the individual investor provides a viewpoint to media outlets that is very rarely included in their interviews or articles - but needs to be.

Hevner has appeared on the three major commercial TV networks, ABC, CBS, and NBC, as well as multiple times on the CNBC business channel and Fox Business channel as an expert commentator on new approaches to investing. He has also been interviewed extensively on radio stations across the country and is often quoted in the national press including the WSJ, Forbes, U.S. News World Report and the NYT among others.

Education Content Provider

Hevner and the NAOI have provided multiple financial Web sites with an education section; a component that the NAOI knows will attract far more visitors than competing Web sites that don’t. As examples, Hevner is a contributing author to the site at www.nasdaq.com where his articles can be read. He has also supplied education content to J.K. Lasser and Investor Place, to name just a few.

A Leading Investing “Futurist” and Strategic Advisor

Hevner is seen by the media as one of the market’s leading futurists and is often called upon to describe his unique vision of how investing must, and will, evolve in the near future to better meet the challenges of modern markets. He has also served as a strategic advisor to financial organizations; showing them how to design investment products that better meet the wants and needs of both individual and institutional investors.

Hevner has spoken at multiple conferences around the world as well as participated in a variety of round-table discussions and debates. His presentations center on “thinking differently” about how portfolios should be designed and managed today. He also challenges many fundamental concepts used by the financial industry today such as how investing risk should be defined and how it can be reduced. His vision of “the future of investing” is unique in the financial services industry today.

Hevner has positioned and structured the NAOI to develop a better future of investing, one in which both investors and investment professionals can take far better advantage of the wealth generation potential of equity markets.

Financial Consultant

Based on his experience in working with the investing public and his research efforts, Hevner has provided consulting services to governments, academic institutions and financial organizations around the world. Following is one example.

The Government of Dubai

Dubai, United Arab Emirates

Dubai, United Arab Emirates

In 2006 Hevner was engaged to participate in the development of an Investor Education Program for the citizens of Dubai in the United Arab Emirates. Among the project goals was the empowerment of average citizens of this rising Middle East financial center to invest in Dubai Markets.

For this purpose Hevner spent considerable time in-country studying the market, the local stock exchange, Dubai financial regulatory bodies and the state of public investor education. Based on this research Hevner presented a comprehensive Investor Education Program to the Government of Dubai that was accepted and implemented.

Certified Investment Advisor

By passing a series of rigorous tests, Hevner has been certified by the North American Securities Administrators Association as a qualified Investment Advisor. While not currently active in this role, the knowledge he gained from the certification process has given him an in-depth understanding of how the financial services industry works today along with a clear vision of how it must change to better meet the needs of the investing public. He uses this knowledge to teach individuals how to more effectively interact with financial advisors.

Education

Hevner holds an MBA from Purdue University’s Krannert School of Business with a concentration on data analysis and systems modeling. He has a B.S. degree is in Computer Science from the Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology with minor degrees in Psychology and Russian

Hobbies

Hevner decompresses and rejuvenates by running Marathons; having finished 20+ races. He particularly favors the Marine Corp Marathon in Washington D.C.

Contact Information

Email at LHevner@naoi.org  
Phone: 813-847-2121
Web Site: www.naoi.org

Connect with Leland on LinkedIn at: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lelandhevner