George Soros biography. The biography of George Soros is a story worth a billion. Big financial loss

George Soros (Soros) real name (Gyorgy Shorosh) was born in Budapest on August 12, 1930 in a Jewish family of average means. George's father was a lawyer and publisher (tried to publish a magazine in Esperanto). In 1914, he volunteered for the front, was captured by the Russians and was exiled to Siberia, from where he fled back to his native Budapest. During the time of repression, thanks to false documents made by his father, the Soros family escaped persecution by the Nazis and in 1947 safely emigrated to the UK. At this time, Soros was already 17 years old. Here Soros entered the London School of Economics and successfully graduated three years later. He was lectured by the Austrian philosopher Karl Popper, who later became his mentor. George's life goal was Karl Popper's idea of creating a so-called open society on earth. In this regard, he organized numerous charitable organizations around the world.

In England, George Soros found work in a haberdashery factory. The position was called assistant manager, but in fact he worked as a salesman. Then George turned into a traveling salesman, driving around in a cheap Ford and selling goods to various merchants in the seaside resorts of Wales. Simultaneously with the work of a traveling salesman, Soros tried to get a job in all the merchant banks in London. But everywhere he was refused due to his nationality and the lack of a protégé. Only in 1953 did he get a job in the company "Singer and Friedlander", from his compatriot Hungarian. Work and at the same time an internship took place in the arbitration department, which was located next to the stock exchange. Its leader traded shares of gold mining companies. But boring work did not inspire George Soros, and three years later he found a way to move to America.

He arrived in the USA in 1956 at the invitation of the father of his London friend, a certain Mayer, who had his own small brokerage firm on Wall Street. A career in the United States began with international arbitration, that is, buying securities in one country and selling them in another. After the Suet crisis, this type of business did not go as well as Soros wanted and he created a new method of trading, calling it internal arbitrage (selling separately combined securities of stocks, bonds and warrants before they could be officially separated from each other). Prior to Kennedy's introduction of a surcharge on foreign investment, this type of activity brought in a good income. After that, Soros' business was destroyed overnight and he returned to philosophy. From 1963 to 1966, he tried to rewrite the dissertation on which he began working after business school and returned to writing his treatise "The Heavy Burden of Consciousness", but the demanding George Soros was not satisfied with his brainchild, as he believed that he was simply conveying the thoughts of his great teacher.

At this, the career of the philosopher was terminated and in 1966 he returned to business. From the company's capital of 100 thousand dollars, Soros created an investment fund with a capital of 4 million dollars. Having received significant profits in three years of work, in 1969 Soros became the head and co-owner of a fund called Double Eagle and later developed into the famous Quantum Group. The fund carried out speculative transactions with securities that brought him millions of dollars in profit. By mid-1990, Quantum's capital was $10 billion. To date, every dollar invested in this fund has turned into 5.5 thousand US dollars. A significant day on September 15, 1992, when, thanks to the operations undertaken by Soros associated with a sharp fall in the British pound, his fortune increased by another 1 billion dollars. After that day, Soros became known as "The Man Who Broke the Bank of England." The Open Society Fund was the start of Soros' philanthropic career. Now he has established charitable foundations in more than 25 countries. Back in 1988, Soros organized the Cultural Initiative Foundation in the USSR to support science, culture, and education. But the "Cultural Initiative" fund was closed, as the money was not used for its intended purpose, but was used for personal purposes by certain individuals. In 1995, the decision was made to start over in Russia, and a new Open Society Foundation was organized. George Soros is the first in Russia since 1996. finances the project "Internet University Centers". The aim of the project was to open and maintain for five years the functioning of centers for open access to the global information computer network Internet at 32 Russian universities. This project was financed together with the government of the Russian Federation. Soros' contribution was $100 million, and the Russian government's contribution was $30 million. It is believed that this is the only obligation that the government has fulfilled in full and on time. George Soros is called nothing less than a living legend of the financial market or a financial genius. Back in 1994, investments in a network of charitable foundations and other institutions reached $300 million, in 1995 and 1996 - $350 million each. But since 1997, Soros has had a "black streak". Almost all investments brought huge losses. Deciding to retire, he came to grips with the funding programs for science and the arts. And all his failures began with the acquisition of a controlling stake in the Russian company Svyazinvest (in 1998 he himself called this investment "the main mistake of his life"). In 1990, on the initiative of Soros, the Central European University was founded in Budapest, Prague and Warsaw. And he is also an honorary doctor of the New School for Social Research (New York), Oxford and Yale Universities.

George Soros is known not only as a financier and philanthropist, but also as a social thinker, author of a number of books and articles, for whom the formation of an open society in the post-communist world is a fundamental value and central idea. In addition to numerous articles, George Soros has written the books "Alchemy of Finance" (1987), "Discovering the Soviet System" (1990), "Supporting Democracy" (1991).

As of November 2009, the fortune of George Soros was estimated at 11 billion dollars, as of September 2012 - 19 billion. For 2016 - 24.9 billion US dollars. According to Business Week magazine, he has donated more than $5 billion to charitable causes throughout his life, with one billion of that five coming from Russia.

In November 2015, the Open Society Foundation was placed on the list of "undesirable" NGOs in Russia, which made it impossible for it to continue working in Russia.

In 2017, the Hungarian ruling party FIDES, in particular its leaders, said that 2017 will be marked by the fact that it will begin with an amendment to the law from 2011, according to which NGO leaders will have to declare their assets.

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Characteristic roles that I shied away from in my youth

George Soros (György Shorosh)
(Eng. George Soros, Hung. Soros György) -
American financier, investor and
philanthropist. proponent of the theory
open society and adversary
"market fundamentalism".
Its activity causes
mixed rating in different countries
and various circles of society.

short biography

Voluntarily parting with some of his wealth, George Soros
managed to leave a mark in many areas outside the world of finance and in
to some extent even influence the course of history. Investor and speculator
George Soros also managed to become famous as both a philanthropist and a philosopher.
and as a politician with very liberal views.

George Soros

middle class family. George's father was a lawyer and publisher. In
times of repression thanks to false documents produced by
father, the Soros family escaped Nazi persecution and in 1947
She emigrated safely to the UK. At this time, Soros was
17 years. Here Soros entered the London School of Economics and
successfully graduated in three years.

George Soros

found a job in a haberdashery factory.

The position was called assistant manager, but in fact he
worked as a salesperson. Then George turned into a traveling salesman
driving around in a cheap Ford and offering goods to various
merchants in the seaside resorts of Wales. He also managed to work
waiter in a restaurant, apple picker and porter at the station, but
did not give up hope of getting a job in a bank. Even then he led
meticulous bookkeeping of their meager finances. “I started with a weekly
budget of 4 pounds, then tried to meet the amount of less than 4 pounds, and
in my diary, I kept track of my income and expenses,” recalls
smile the current billionaire.

Graduated from the London School of Economics George Soros got
position in an investment company. He worked and trained in
arbitration department, which was located very close to the London
stock exchange.

He arrived in the USA in 1956 at the invitation of his father London
a friend who had his own small brokerage firm on Wall Street.
Career in the United States began with international arbitration, that is, the purchase
securities in one country and selling them in another. After the Suet
crisis, this type of business did not go as well as Soros wanted, and he
created a new method of trading, calling it internal arbitrage
(separate sale of combined securities of shares,
bonds and warrants before they could be formally separated
from each other).
Prior to Kennedy's imposition of a surcharge on foreign
investments this type of activity brought a good income. Thereafter
Soros' business was destroyed overnight and he returned to philosophy. FROM
1963 to 1966 he tries to rewrite his thesis on which
started working after business school and went back to writing his
treatise “The Heavy Burden of Consciousness”, but the demanding George Soros did not
was satisfied with his offspring, because he believed that he was simply transmitting
thoughts of his great teacher.

In the end, working at Arnhold & S. Bleichroeder, in which
rose to the post of vice president, George Soros decided that as
he is much more talented as an investor than as a philosopher or top manager.
In 1967, he managed to convince the management of Arnhold & S. Bleichroeder
found an offshore investment fund, First Eagle, managed by
Soros. In 1969, the company, together with George Soros, established
another fund, this time the Double Eagle hedge fund, manage
who were also entrusted to George Soros. When regulators
limited Soros' ability to manage funds, he left his
leadership positions and in 1970, together with Jim Rogers
(Jim Rogers) founded the famous Quantum Foundation. The Fund carried out
speculative transactions with securities, as a result of which it
profitability in the first ten years of its existence was 3365% in
year. It is to this foundation that Soros owes much of his
huge fortune.

But since 1997, Soros has had a “black streak”. Almost all
investments brought huge losses. Deciding to retire, he came close
engaged in funding programs for science and the arts. And all his
failures began with the acquisition of a controlling stake in the Russian
company Svyazinvest (in 1998 he himself called this investment “the main
the mistake of my life).

George Soros became famous as a talented investor and as one
of the most generous billionaires along with Carnegie and Rockefeller.
However, most of all he values his intellectual
achievements. From a young age, he dreamed of becoming the second Keynes or
Einstein. While studying at the London School of Economics, he studied
finance, but most of all was fond of philosophy. His especially
interested in the views of the Anglo-Austrian philosopher Karl Popper,
who, during the training of Soros, taught at the London School
economics and, at least formally, was the mentor of the young
Hungarian immigrant.

Soros used Popper's views to develop the so-called
“theories of market reflexivity”, which he successfully applied in
stock game. According to this theory, traders make decisions about
purchases and sales of securities based on future price expectations,
and since expectations are a psychological category, they can be
certain information impact. At the same time, moods and
the expectations of individual market participants are reflected in the nature
market transactions, which could distort the impact of fundamental
factors to the market.

Soros confidently states in his books that this philosophical doctrine
turned out to be very useful in the financial market. However, people who
cooperated closely with him, claim that taking investment
decisions, he rather relies on his intuition and the gift of financial
vision rather than his philosophy. His son Robert says: “He
buys when his back starts to hurt, and sells when the pain
passes.

Soros is also accused of using the stock market insider
information, which he receives from high-ranking officials
states and companies. Once he was already seen in a scandal with
using such information. In 2002, the Paris Court recognized
George Soros guilty of obtaining confidential information in
for profit and sentenced to a fine of 2.2 million euros. By
According to the court, thanks to this information, Soros earned about $ 2 million.
on the shares of the French bank Societe Generale.

Of all the financial transactions that Soros conducted, the most
his currency speculations are known. On Black Wednesday September 16th
1992 Soros opened a short position on the pound sterling
more than $10 billion, earning more than $1.1 billion in one day. As a result
Soros operations, the Bank of England was forced to conduct a massive
foreign exchange intervention and, ultimately, to withdraw the pound sterling from
mechanism for regulating the exchange rates of European countries, which led to
instant fall of the pound against major currencies. Exactly
from that moment on, Soros began to be referred to in the press as “a man who
brought down the Bank of England.

George Soros carried out risky operations using
loans, doing what is usually not done on the market, preferring
more reliable methods. But, apparently, Soros is especially pleased with the excitement
stock market game and the opportunity to emerge as a “winner” from a difficult situation,
which he created for himself. George Soros, like his father, loves
danger and risk. He admitted to his biographer that his best year
life began in 1944, when he and his family were in a mortal
danger. This year, George Soros saw a woman threatening to be shot
his father's forgery saved the lives of members
his family and many other people, while hundreds of thousands of Jews were
destroyed by the Nazi regime. “I was lucky that my father was from
those who did not act as people usually do,” says George Soros.
“If you act normally, you will most likely die.
Many Jews then did not take any action to hide
or leave the string. And my family is lucky. My father was not afraid to go
at risk. A life lesson that I learned during the war,
is that sometimes you can lose everything, even your own life,
if you don't risk it."

Becoming a rich and influential person,

George Soros

modest in outward expression of his powerful status. He is not
collects expensive cars, does not buy sports teams and
luxurious castles and other toys that billionaires brag about
each other. Soros dresses modestly and eats modestly in his
apartment in New York, where it is simply “convenient and pleasant for him to live and receive
sometimes guests. However, by their actions - be it charity
financial or political activity - Soros appears as a man
divine proportions, a personality that can bring down
national currencies, form the direction of development of entire
regions. George Soros provides financial support for initiatives to
legalizing marijuana for medical purposes and allowing same-sex
barkov. He has spent over $23 million supporting 527 bands
against the re-election of George W. Bush for a second term.
However, such a position in life fits perfectly into the image
philosophizing billionaire who senses the power and opportunity
make the world a better place. “I have always felt like an exceptional person,”
George Soros admits.

Now George Soros lives in the penthouse of one of the skyscrapers in
downtown New York. He arrived in Manhattan about 50 years ago with
big ambitions and just a couple of dollars in your pocket. Today he
richer and more powerful than many states whose flags fly from
UN Headquarters near his current home. However, despite
on this, the walking embodiment of the American dream, the world's first man,
who managed to earn 20 billion in one year and became famous
the collapse of the Bank of England, remains a mystery to the whole world in many
relationships. His philosophical revelations and thoughts about finance and
economics in numerous books and publications is actually in
once again convince of the ambiguity of the figures of George Soros.

Journalists and biographers have not come to a consensus about what
is the secret of his success, and what motives underlie his
actions.

Source: Wikipedia, en.wikipedia.org

The material was prepared on the basis of information from open sources

George Soros (Eng. George Soros, Hung. Soros György), real name is Schwartz. Born August 12, 1930 in Budapest. American financier, investor. A supporter of the theory of an open society and an opponent of "market fundamentalism" (in this direction, close to the social ideas of Karl Popper). Creator of a network of charitable organizations known as the Soros Foundation. Member of the Executive Committee of the International Crisis Group.

His activities are controversial in different countries and different circles of society. Often referred to as a financial speculator, as well as a supporter of the legalization of marijuana for medical use. Considered "the man who ruined the Bank of England", the scientific term "soros" was formed from his name to refer to large speculators who launch currency crises for "profit and pleasure" (Paul Krugman, 1996).

Born into a Jewish family of average income. His father, Tivadar Schwartz, was a lawyer, a prominent figure in the city's Jewish community, an Esperanto specialist, and an Esperantist writer. In 1936, the family changed their surname to the Hungarian version of Shorosh (Soros). The elder brother is engineer, entrepreneur and philanthropist Paul Soros (1926-2013).

In 1947, Soros moved to England, where he entered the London School of Economics and Political Science and successfully graduated three years later. He was lectured by the Austrian philosopher Karl Popper, who had a great influence on him, whose ideological follower he became. In England, he found work in a haberdashery factory, and then turned into a traveling salesman, but did not leave the search for work in a bank. In 1953 he got a job at Singer & Friedlander. Work and at the same time an internship took place in the arbitration department, which was located next to the stock exchange.

By 1956, Soros began his career as a financier. He arrived in New York at the invitation of the father of his London friend, a certain Mayer, who had his own small brokerage firm on Wall Street. A career in the United States began with international arbitration, that is, buying securities in one country and selling them in another. Soros created a new method of trading, which he called internal arbitrage - selling separately combined securities of stocks, bonds and warrants before they could be officially separated from each other. In 1963, Kennedy introduced a surcharge on foreign investment, and Soros closed his business. By 1967 he was head of research at Arnhold and S. Bleichroeder, a prominent European stock brokerage firm.

In 1969, Soros became the head and co-owner of the Double Eagle fund, which later grew into the famous Quantum Foundation. Soros named the fund after Karl Heisenberg, a German theoretical physicist, one of the founders of quantum mechanics, and his uncertainty principle. The Fund carried out speculative operations with securities with varying success.

It is believed that on the sharp fall of the British pound against the German mark on September 16, 1992, Soros earned more than a billion dollars in a day. Soros began to call this day, known as "Black Wednesday" - "White Wednesday", and he himself is celebrated as "the man who broke the Bank of England", although his role in the fall of the pound is clearly exaggerated.

After that, a “black streak” began in the life of Soros. In 1997, together with Potanin, he created the Mustcom offshore, which paid $1.875 billion for a 25% stake in Svyazinvest, but after the 1998 crisis, the share price fell by more than half. Soros angrily called this purchase "the worst investment of money in my life." After long attempts, in 2004 he sold shares in Svyazinvest for $625 million to Access Industries, headed by Leonard Blavatnik, who is also a shareholder in TNK-BP. At the end of 2006, Blavatnik sold a blocking stake for $1.3 billion to Comstar-UTS, which is part of AFK Sistema.

Gradually, Soros moves away from financial speculation and declares charitable activities, including in the field of education and scientific research. He makes statements about the necessity and usefulness of restrictions in the financial sector, including to reduce the investment opportunities of large financial structures.

On July 26, 2011, he announced the closure of his investment fund and the return to third-party investors of their investments in the amount of about one billion dollars. The investors were informed about this decision by the head of the fund by a special letter. As Soros announced on the same day, starting next year, he will only increase his personal capital and the funds of his family. Soros's sons Jonathan and Robert, deputy chairmen of the board of the fund, explained that the decision to close the fund is due to changes in US legislation that are being developed as part of the ongoing financial reform in the US. We are talking about the new Dodd-Frank law, known by the name of its developers - congressmen Chris Dodd and Barney Frank, which imposes a number of significant restrictions on hedge funds: until March 2012, all hedge funds operating in the country must be registered with the US Securities and Exchange Commission, as well as hedge funds are required to disclose all information about their investors, assets, investment policy, as well as possible conflicts of interest.

In September 2013, he married for the third time, 42-year-old Tamiko Bolton became his chosen one, they met five years ago, and in August they announced their engagement.

He became famous after the "black Wednesday" on September 16, 1992 - the day of a significant drop in the value of the pound sterling against the German mark. It is believed that in one day his profit amounted to more than a billion dollars. It is known that on the eve of Soros spoke with Helmut Schlesinger, President of the Bundesbank, and found out the intentions of Germany, which allowed him to act more confidently.

The main speculations in the global financial markets were carried out through the Quantum Fund NV hedge fund, registered on the Caribbean island of Curacao, owned by the Netherlands, due to offshore conditions. It is the largest fund within the Soros-controlled Quantum Group of Funds.

There are two main points of view regarding the financial success of Soros. According to the first point of view, Soros owes his success to the gift of financial foresight. Another says that in making important decisions, Soros uses insider information provided by high-ranking officials from the political and financial circles of the largest countries in the world.

Soros himself tried to explain the tremendous success by applying his theory of the reflexivity of stock markets, according to which decisions about buying and selling securities are made on the basis of future price expectations, and since expectations are a psychological category, they can be the object of information influence. An attack on the currency of a country consists of successive information strikes through the media and analytical publications, combined with the real actions of currency speculators that shake the financial market.

In 2002, a Parisian court found George Soros guilty of obtaining confidential information for profit and fined him 2.2 million euros. According to the court, thanks to this information, the millionaire earned about $ 2 million on the shares of the French bank Societe Generale. Subsequently, the fine was reduced to 0.9 million euros. Soros appealed to the European Court of Human Rights, but in 2011 he did not see in the condemnation of violations, by four votes to three.

In the political field, he proved himself as a sponsor and an influential lobbyist. He was instrumental in the fall of communist regimes in Eastern Europe during the Velvet Revolutions of 1989. He also played a prominent role in the preparation and conduct of the Georgian Rose Revolution of 2003, although Soros himself claimed that his role was greatly exaggerated by the press.

Mikhail Kasyanov recalled how, when Russia received IMF support in the difficult situation of 1998, on August 13, “George Soros made a statement that Russia needed devaluation and that the IMF underestimated the seriousness of the problem. The market opened and immediately “died”. The next day, Friday, the president swore that there would be no devaluation…”.

In the United States, he was very active during the 2004 presidential campaign, because he considered Bush's policy to be dangerous for the United States and the world. He spent $27 million promoting change in American politics. Since 2005, he has contributed to the creation and funding of the Democratic Alliance (Democracy Alliance) - an organization that unites and guides American progressives within the Democratic Party. Soros will support the candidacy of Hillary Clinton in the US presidential election in 2016.

It is considered one of the main sponsors of campaigns for reforms in the legislative regulation of drug trafficking, including the movement for the legalization of marijuana and the decriminalization of drug use. In his opinion, the legalization of marijuana will simultaneously increase budget revenues and reduce the number of crimes that accompany drug trafficking.

From 1994 to 2014, Soros donated about $200 million to support reforms in this industry. The largest recipient of his donations is the Drug Policy Alliance. In 2007, he sent 400 thousand dollars to support the passage of an act in the Senate and the House of Representatives of Massachusetts to liberalize and mitigate penalties for possession and consumption of marijuana), in 2008 this law was passed. In 2010, Soros donated $1 million to a similar initiative in California, but the referendum ended in its rejection.

In early January 2015, Soros called for urgent financial assistance to Ukraine in the amount of 20 billion euros to support the "belligerent side". German Economic News quoted Soros as saying that "Russia's attack on Ukraine is a direct attack on the EU and its principles."

Greetings! Who is George Soros? On the one hand, the famous philanthropist, politician, investor and even philosopher. On the other hand, he is a ruthless speculator, a supporter of the legalization of soft drugs and a sponsor of the opposition in various countries.

Getting acquainted? George Soros: The biography of the man who brought down the Bank of England.

George Soros is not the real name of the billionaire. At birth, he was named Gyorgy Schwartz. The legendary investor was unlucky three times: he was born into a Jewish family in Budapest in the mid-1930s.

During the Nazi occupation, the family survived only thanks to George's father, a lawyer and Esperanto specialist. He forged documents for the whole family, changing the Jewish surname to a Hungarian one.

In 1947, Soros ended up in the UK, where he successfully graduated from the London School of Economics and Political Science. His idol was the Austrian lecturer, philosopher and anti-communist Karl Popper with his concept of an "open society". The main message of the theory: in an open society, people make decisions using intelligence and critical thinking.

After graduation, the future billionaire “looks for himself” for some time. In his youth, he manages to work as a salesman, a waiter in a restaurant, an apple picker, a station porter and an assistant manager at a haberdashery factory.

Unfortunately, it was almost impossible to get a job in the financial sector without patrons (and even a Jew) at that time.

The beginning of a financial career

In 1956, a friend of his father invited Soros to move to the United States. There, young George learns the secrets of buying and selling securities at a Wall Street brokerage.

Even then, Soros did not like to work according to the knurled pattern. He comes up with a new way of trading - internal arbitrage. The bottom line: to sell separately securities from a package of bonds, powers of attorney and shares before they are officially divided.

Around the same time, George creates his own theory: “market reflection”, which he later describes more than once in his books. The main idea: the future price of any asset depends not only on political and economic changes, but also on the psychology of the crowd.

The day when any currency "dies" can be organized artificially. You just need to correctly use the world's media and put pressure on analysts and traders. Looking ahead, I will say that Soros subsequently applied the theory of "market reflection" in practice. The financial crises caused by it destroyed the lives of thousands of people and seriously affected the economies of individual countries.

In 1970, the legendary hedge fund Quantum was born. George Soros co-founded it with Jim Rogers. What does the foundation do? It attracts funds from a narrow circle of people and invests them in high-yield assets.

The history of Quantum resembles a cardiogram with sharp ups and downs. But in general, the results of the fund's work are impressive. Quantum investors earned about $32 billion from investments in the fund. By the way, this is a confident first place in terms of profit in the entire history of hedge funds.

The legend of the "black environment"

I'll start from afar. In October 1990, Soros met Stanley Druckenmiller, a Wall Street fund manager. Despite the fact that the age difference is 30 years, the financiers have become friends. Two years later, 32-year-old Stanley Druckenmiller headed the legendary Quantum Fund.

How did Soros and his friend collapse the pound? In the early 90s, both of them bought government bonds and British currency a little bit. In the fall of 1992, the pound was steadily declining throughout the week. Friends-speculators decided to make money on it. Soros added a personal capital of £5bn to the fund's money. And put a short position for a total amount of more than 10 billion pounds.

The British currency immediately collapsed to a minimum. Having bought the pound at the lowest price, Soros earned more than one billion on the deal! An impressive premium for the collapse of the currency of the largest European country.

By his speculation, George forced the Bank of England to make a large injection of foreign exchange from government reserves. And he took the pound out of the European currency regulation mechanism.

In 1993, Soros again became famous throughout the world. He was recognized as the most successful investor in the investment market. In a year, Soros earned an amount equal to the GDP of 43 states or the income of the largest McDonald's corporation.

In 1997, Soros decided to repeat the "British collapse" in South Asia, attacking the currencies of Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines and Singapore. The financial panic in Asian markets provoked a deep economic crisis. The Prime Minister of Malaysia directly accused Soros of destabilizing the country. As a result of the attack, the Malaysian economy was thrown back 15 years and barely recovered from the blow.

During his financial career, George Soros pulled off a lot of dubious transactions. For example, he bought MGM shares with a limit of $1.35 million. Before reaching a certain price, the deal was closed automatically. Soros bought shares 60 days before the massacre at the Mandalay Bay Hotel in Las Vegas.

Speculator's catastrophic mistakes

George Soros' biggest financial failure has to do with Russia. In 1997, together with the Russian oligarch Potanin, he created the Mustcom offshore and bought a 25% stake in Svyazinvest through it.

And in 1998, a default struck in Russia. All prices have tripled. On the purchase and sale of Svyazinvest, the legendary speculator lost $1.25 billion.

The "Russian failure" was Soros' first major failure. Others followed. In 1999, George confidently predicted a fall in the assets of Internet companies - and lost $ 700 million on this. A little later, the speculator mistakenly bet on the growth of the euro - and became poorer by another $ 300 million.

The total loss of Soros for 1999 exceeded $1.5 billion. Clients began to massively withdraw their investments from funds. For so many years, this was the most crushing blow to the reputation of the legendary speculator. But Soros managed to stop the process. He was even able to attract new investors by investing in the same internet companies, this time bullish. By 2000, Quantum Fund's turnover had grown to $10.5 billion.

However, unexpectedly for everyone, the NASDAQ index fell seriously. In April 2000, the Soros Foundation lost $5 billion, 2.5 times more than in 1999. In 2004, the billionaire liquidates the fund. And in 2011, he officially “retires”, having completed 40 years of work in the field of hedge fund management. From that moment on, the legendary speculator and philanthropist is engaged only in personal projects and manages exclusively family capital.

Nevertheless, according to the results of 2012, Soros is ranked 30th in the list of the richest people in the world (with a fortune of $19.2 billion).

P.S. My favorite quote from George Soros: "Success requires leisure - time that belongs entirely to you."

USA USA Mother Elizabeth Soros[d] Spouse Tamiko Bolton[d]

His activities are controversial in different countries and different circles of society. Soros is often referred to as a financial speculator, “the man who ruined the Bank of England”, from his name the term “soros” was formed to refer to large speculators who launch currency crises for “profit and pleasure” (Paul Krugman, 1996). He is also considered a supporter of the legalization of marijuana for medical use.

Biography

By 1956, Soros began his career as a financier. He arrived in New York at the invitation of the father of his London friend, one Mayer, who had his own small brokerage firm on Wall Street. A career in the US began with international arbitrage, that is, buying securities in one country and selling them in another. Soros created a new method of trading, calling it internal arbitration- selling separately combined securities of shares, bonds and warrants before they can be officially separated from each other. In 1963, Kennedy introduced a surcharge on foreign investment, and Soros closed his business. By 1967 he was head of research at Arnhold and S. Bleichroeder, a well-known brokerage firm specializing in European stock markets.

In 1969, Soros became the manager of the Double Eagle fund, founded by Arnhold and S. Bleichroeder. In 1973, he left Arnhold and S. Bleichroeder and, together with Jim Rogers, based on the assets of investors in the Double Eagle fund, founded a fund that later became known as Quantum (a term from the field of quantum mechanics). Soros was the senior partner, Rogers was the junior partner until he retired in 1980. The division of labor in managing the fund between Soros and Rogers was that Rogers did most of the analytical work, but Soros made the decisions about when to make deals. The fund carried out speculative operations with securities, currencies, exchange-traded goods and achieved great success, during their joint work from 1970 to 1980, Soros and Rogers never suffered a loss, Soros's personal fortune by the end of 1980 was estimated at $ 100 million, in June In 1981, Soros was named the world's greatest fund manager by Institutional Investor magazine. Despite the fund's success in the long run, it had bad years - if in 1980 the profit was 100%, then the next year the fund lost 23%. Soros' decision during Black Monday in 1987 to close all positions and go cash was one of the biggest setbacks of his career. If before "Black Monday" the annual profitability of "Quantum" was 60%, then a week later the fund turned into a loss, with a loss of 10% in annual terms.

In 1988, Soros invited Stanley Druckenmiller to join his fund, who played an important role in subsequent investment decisions until 2000, when he left Quantum. It is believed that on the sharp fall of the British pound against the German mark on September 16, 1992, Soros earned more than a billion dollars in a day. Soros began to call this day, known as “Black Wednesday” - “White Wednesday”, and he himself is celebrated as “the man who broke the Bank of England”, although his role in the fall of the pound is clearly exaggerated.

Gradually, Soros moves away from financial speculation and declares charitable activities, including in the field of education and scientific research. He makes statements about the need and usefulness of restrictions in the financial sector, including to reduce the investment opportunities of large financial structures.

On July 26, 2011, he announced the closure of his investment fund and the return to third-party investors of their investments in the amount of about one billion dollars. The investors were informed about this decision of the head of the fund by a special letter . As Soros stated on the same day, - starting next year, he will only increase his personal capital and the funds of his family. Soros's sons Jonathan and Robert, deputy chairmen of the board of the fund, explained that the decision to close the fund is due to changes in US legislation that are being developed as part of the ongoing financial reform in the US. We are talking about the new law Dodd - Frank, known by the name of its developers - Congressmen Chris Dodd and Barney Frank (eng. Barney Frank), which imposes a number of significant restrictions on hedge funds: until March 2012, all hedge funds operating in the country must be registered with the US Securities and Exchange Commission, as well as hedge funds are required to disclose all information about their investors, assets, investment policy, as well as possible conflicts of interest.

In September 2013, he married for the third time, 42-year-old Tamiko Bolton became his chosen one, they met five years ago, and in August they announced their engagement.

Financial activities

Soros himself tried to explain the tremendous success by applying his theory of the reflexivity of stock markets, according to which decisions about buying and selling securities are made on the basis of future price expectations, and since expectations are a psychological category, they can be the object of information influence. An attack on the currency of a state consists of successive information strikes through the media and custom articles in analytical publications, combined with the real actions of currency speculators that shake the financial market.

In 2002, a Parisian court found George Soros guilty of obtaining confidential information for profit and fined him 2.2 million euros. According to the court, thanks to this information, the millionaire earned about $ 2 million on shares in the French bank Societe Generale. Subsequently, the fine was reduced to 0.9 million euros. Soros appealed to the European Court of Human Rights, but in 2011 he did not see in the condemnation of violations, by four votes against three.

Open Society Foundation

In 1995-2001, a monthly Soros Educational Journal (SOJ) was published under the International Soros Education Program in the Exact Sciences (ISSEP). SOZH publications had a natural-scientific direction; target group - high school students. The journal was distributed free of charge to schools (more than 30 thousand copies), municipal and university libraries (3.5 thousand copies).

The textbook of cultural studies and the textbook of history published by the Soros Foundation were sharply criticized.

At the end of 2003, Soros officially cut off financial support for his activities in Russia, and in 2004 the Open Society Institute stopped issuing grants. But the structures created with the assistance of the Soros Foundation still work without its direct participation: the Moscow higher school social and economic sciences (MVSESEN, established in 1995 with a grant from the Soros Foundation), the Foundation for Culture and Art, the D.S. Likhachev International Charitable Foundation, non-profit foundation for the support of book publishing, education and new information technologies "Pushkin Library" .

The activity of the Soros Foundation was terminated in the Republic Belarus in 1997 .

As of November 2009, the fortune of George Soros was estimated at 11 billion dollars, as of September 2012 - 19 billion. According to Business Week magazine, he donated more than $5 billion to charitable causes throughout his life, with one billion of those five coming from Russia.

In November 2015, the Open Society Foundation was placed on the list of "undesirable" NGOs in Russia, which made it impossible for it to continue working in Russia.

Political activism and lobbying

In the United States, he was very active during the 2004 presidential campaign, because he considered Bush's policy to be dangerous for the United States and the world. He spent $27 million promoting change in American politics. Since 2005, he has contributed to the creation and funding of the Democratic Alliance (Eng. Democracy Alliance) is an organization that unites and guides American progressives within the Democratic Party. Soros supported the candidacy of Hillary Clinton in the 2016 US presidential election.

It is considered one of the main sponsors of campaigns for reforms in the legal regulation of drug trafficking, including the movement for the legalization of marijuana and the decriminalization of drug use. In his opinion, the legalization of marijuana will simultaneously increase budget revenues and reduce the number of crimes that accompany drug trafficking. From 1994 to 2014, Soros donated about $200 million to support reforms in this industry. The largest recipient of his donations is the Drug Policy Alliance. In 2007, sent 400 thousand dollars to support passage in the Senate and House of Representatives of Massachusetts act on the liberalization and mitigation of penalties for the possession and use of marijuana), in 2008 this law was adopted. In 2010, Soros donated $1 million to a similar initiative in California, but the referendum ended with her rejection.

In early January 2015, Soros called for urgent financial assistance to Ukraine in the amount of 20 billion euros to support the "belligerent side". The German Economic News quoted Soros as saying that "Russia's attack on Ukraine is a direct attack on the EU and its principles".

On November 12, 2015, President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko awarded George Soros with the Order of Freedom. Poroshenko noted the significant role of the international Renaissance Foundation, founded by Soros, in the development of the Ukrainian state and the establishment of democracy. In addition, Poroshenko expressed gratitude for the efforts of Soros and his long-term comprehensive plan to support Ukraine, as well as for professional advice on public finance issues.

Compositions

Soros J. Soros on Soros. - M. : Infra-M, 1996. - 336 p. - ISBN 5-86225-305-X.
Soros J. Alchemy of finance. - M. : Infra-M, 2001. - 208 p. - ISBN 5-86225-166-9.
Soros George. The bubble of American dominance. Where should American power be directed? / transl from English. - M.: Alpina Business Books, 2004, 192 p. 10000 copies
Soros J. Open Society. Reforming global capitalism. Per. from English. - M .: Non-profit Foundation "Support for Culture, Education and New Information Technologies", 2001. - 458 p., ISBN 5-94072-001-3, shooting gallery. 10000 copies
Soros J. About globalization. - M. : Eksmo, 2004. - 224 p. - ISBN 5-699-07924-6.
Soros J."Fund" for Russia. What was, what will be. - M. : Algorithm, 2015. - 224 p. - (Dangerous knowledge). - 2000 copies. - ISBN 978-5-906798-99-2.
Soros, George."The Crisis of World Capitalism." (1999).
Soros, George. New paradigm of financial markets. Mann, Ivanov & Ferber, 2008.

Notes

Internet Movie Database - 1990.
Encyclopædia Britannica
RKDartists
George Soros ties the knot - 2013.
crisisgroup.org
1. 19 George Soros, Forbes. Retrieved November 11, 2016.

George Soros biography. The biography of George Soros is a story worth a billion. Big financial loss

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The beginning of a financial career

The legend of the "black environment"

Speculator's catastrophic mistakes

Biography

Financial activities

Open Society Foundation

Political activism and lobbying

Compositions

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