MELISSA LEE
Host, “Fast Money” & “Options Action”

Melissa Lee is the host of CNBC's "Fast Money" (M-F 5PM-6PM ET) which originates from the NASDAQ's MarketSite studio in New York's Times Square.  "Fast Money" gives you the information normally reserved for the Wall Street trading floor, enabling you to make decisions that can make you money.  Lee is also the host of "Options Action," (Fridays 11:30PM ET) a new weekly half-hour program that explains the advantages of options trading and demonstrates the strategy using the news of the week.

Before hosting "Fast Money" and "Options Action," Lee was a reporter and anchor for CNBC covering investment banking, hedge funds and private equity.  In 2008, Lee reported and anchored a one-hour documentary, “Made in China: People’s Republic of Profit” from Beijing and Shanghai. She reported extensively for the network on China from the country’s growth to its challenges to the opportunities for U.S. businesses.

Lee also contributes reports to NBC’s “Today” show.

Lee received a 2009 Gerald Loeb Award nomination for a CNBC Special Report entitled "Is Your Money Safe? The Fall of Lehman Brothers” in which she co-anchored.  Lee has also been nominated for two Emmy awards in Business News. In 2007, she was recognized for her report, “The $50M Con,” about a college student-turned scammer who ran a fake hedge fund and was ultimately caught by the FBI. And in 2003, she was nominated for her reporting on the proxy voting of mutual funds.

Prior to joining CNBC in 2004, Lee worked for Bloomberg Television and CNN Financial News.

Before her career in television, Lee was a consultant at Mercer Management Consulting. Her cases focused on the banking and credit card sectors.

Lee graduated with honors from Harvard College with a Bachelor of Arts in Government.  She also served as Assistant Managing Editor of the Harvard Crimson.