George Soros, the multi-billionaire financier and one of the primary source of funds behind the far Left in the US, has had a conviction for insider trading upheld in France today. The case originated when Soros received a tip on a buyout of Societe Generale and started scooping up its stock ahead of the announcement. Soros, of course, proclaims his innocence (hat tip: CQ reader M. DuFresne):

Billionaire investor George Soros failed to erase the only legal blemish on a long financial career Thursday, when a French appeals court upheld his three-year-old conviction for insider trading.

Rejecting Soros' bid to clear his name, the Paris Court of Appeal maintained the guilty verdict and 2.2 million euros fine handed down by a lower court — the same amount that Soros made buying and selling Societe Generale shares in 1988 after receiving information about a planned corporate raid on the bank.

Amusingly, Soros acknowledges that he got the tip and that he began to buy the shares a few days later, but denies that one had anything to do with the other. He claims that he executed the stock purchase as part of a broader plan to take advantage of privatization, but the court found that the information was precise and confidential, and Soros acted in direct reaction to its private revelation. How else could the court rule? If they bought Soros' explanation, no one could ever be prosecuted for insider trading.

I find it amusing anyway that the man who funds the anti-globalist, anti-capitalist Left made his money through currency speculation and apparently some more-than-clever stock transactions in the international market. He escaped to the West from Hungary with next to nothing and made billions by manipulating capital on a global basis. However, once he had his fortune secured, he has appeared intent on making sure that no one gets afforded the same chances he had to succeed.

Seeing him get caught cheating only heightens the overwhelming hypocrisy of Soros. The fact that the Left cheerfully takes Soros' money while excoriating people who make a living out of far less exploitative means of the same globalization they decry demonstrates their overwhelming hypocrisy as well.

Trackback Pings

TrackBack URL for this entry is

Listed below are links to weblogs that reference Soros Conviction Upheld In France:

» Miscellanea: Humor In All Things Edition from Decision '08
George Soros: do as I say, not as I do... [Read More]

Tracked on March 24, 2005 7:24 PM