Matthew Campbell is a Bloomberg reporter and acclaimed investigative journalist. He unearths fantastical stories of corruption, exposing financial fraud and malign geopolitical actors.
He is best known as the co-author of the 2022 book Dead in the Water. The true-crime thriller – selected as a Book of the Year by the Financial Times, The Economist and The Sunday Times – pieced together the truth behind one of the most brazen financial frauds in history. In the process, Campbell exposed the corruption rife within the international shipping industry, an opaque business that powers much of the global economy. It’s back on reading lists this year as concerns mount about the industry.
Campbell has reported from over 25 countries on topics including crime, corruption, terrorism, economics, public health and the environment – from South Africa’s biggest-ever political scandal to the mysterious murder of pharmaceutical tycoon Barry Sherman.
His scoops have won Campbell some of the most prestigious honours in journalism. He and co-author Kit Chellel won Gerald Loeb and Overseas Press Club awards for their coverage of Goldman Sachs’ business dealings with Libyan dictator Muammar Qaddafi. Meanwhile, Campbell himself has also received National Press Club, SOPA and SABEW awards for feature and investigative reporting. He is a 6-time Loeb finalist in addition to his win with Chellel, and in 2022 was a finalist for a National Magazine Award for public interest reporting.
Campbell’s upcoming book, Stealing the Gods: War, Obsession and a Global Search for Lost Treasure, will tell the shocking story of how hundreds of priceless Cambodian artefacts, stolen in the wake of the Khmer Rouge, ended up in US and European museums, as well as the living rooms of billionaires in New York and Palm Beach – before becoming the target of one of the most complex art-market investigations ever undertaken.
Born in Canada, Matthew Campbell was educated at Yale, where he graduated with a BA in political science, and at Oxford, where he received an M.Phil in politics. He currently lives in Singapore with his family, and continues to pursue ambitious investigative stories.
