Zero Hedge is a source of rumors and gossip, advocating an anti-establishment and conspiratorial worldview, and which has been associated with alt-right views and a pro-Russian bias. Zero Hedge's commentary has led to a number of site bans by various global social media platforms.

Zero Hedge's founder and main editor is Daniel Ivandjiiski. He is a Bulgarian-born, U.S.-based blogger who founded the website Zero Hedge in January 2009. Ivandjiiski's Bulgarian citizenship, lifetime ban from securities trading, and his father's own controversial news and political website (Bulgarian: Строго секретно; English "Top Secret") and position in the pre-1990 Bulgarian-Soviet administration are of note.

An ex-employee of Zero Hedge gave an interview to Bloomberg, revealing Ivandjiiski lives in a mansion in New Jersey, saying: Ivandjiiski "lives a lifestyle you only dream of while pretending to speak for you."

The former website staffer said, "I can't be a 24-hour cheerleader for Hezbollah, Moscow, Tehran, Beijing, and Trump anymore. It's wrong. Period. This isn't a revolution. It's a joke." He told Bloomberg that he was pressured to frame issues in a way he felt was "disingenuous," summarizing its political stances as "Russia=good. Bashar al-Assad=benevolent leader. Vladimir Putin=greatest leader in the history of statecraft."

Dr. Craig Pirrong, Professor of Finance at the University of Houston, stated: "I have frequently written that Zero Hedge has the MO of a Soviet agitprop operation, that it reliably peddles Russian propaganda: my first post on this, almost exactly three years ago, noted the parallels between Zero Hedge and Russia Today."

On 20 November 2019, NBC News reported Zero Hedge as the initial source of a "misleading claim about the head of the Ukrainian energy company at the heart of the House impeachment inquiry", which went viral during the impeachment hearings. NBC said that "ZeroHedge apparently misconstrued the original Russian article from the Interfax-Ukraine News Agency, which did not mention an indictment. The Interfax-Ukraine News Agency operates as part of Interfax, a Russian news outlet".