- Following articles about some of George Soros' stock scandals. First from Budapest Times, second from UK Guardian, others mild discussion on Belarus
- The PSzAF said it had fined Soros Fund Management LLC for transactions on the Budapest stock exchange on October 9 that led to a "significant loss in value" of
- Hungarian OTP bank stocks, which fell in days from 4,000 forint (13.2 euros, 17.86 dollars) to 2,500 forint.
The PSzAF "is imposing a 489-million-forint fine on Soros Fund Management LLC... for violating the rules regarding the
the supervisory authority said in a statement on its Internet site.
- The Soros Fund has 30 days to pay this record fine.
The PSzAF said the fund started putting OTP shares up for sale at 4:27 pm on October 9, just minutes before closing.
- "The timing, the number and the effects of these transactions on the market point
- without any doubt to a an illegal market manipulation," it added.
OTP, Hungary's biggest bank, was already hit hard by the financial crisis, like many other banks, but then saw its share value crumble in a few days after October 9.
In a statement Friday, Hungarian-born Soros responded he had been informed of the fine but insisted that he was not involved in the transactions."...Budapest Times, 3/30/09, "Soros Sorry over Decimation of OTP's Share Price" ********12.20.02, guardian uk, "A French court today convicted US billionaire investor George Soros of insider trading and fined him 2.2m euros.
The fine by the court is the same amount the Hungarian-born magnate was accused of having made from buying stocks at French bank Société Générale with insider knowledge 14 years ago. The fine was in line with the request by prosecutors.
Mr Soros, 72, the president of Soros Fund Management, denies having privileged information. He was not in court today.
In court testimony in November, Mr Soros said: "I have been in business all my life, and I think I know what is insider trading and what isn't."
Société Générale was privatised in 1987. A year later, its stock price went up during an unsuccessful takeover bid. Mr Soros was accused of having obtained insider information
before the abortive corporate raid pushed up the stock price.
Mr Soros went on trial with two other men, Jean-Charles Naouri, a former top aide to France's then-finance minister Pierre Beregovoy, and Lebanese businessman Samir Traboulsi. The court cleared both men of any wrongdoing. Prosecutors had sought fines of 290,000 euros for Mr Naouri and 1.98m euros for Mr Traboulsi.
Mr Soros has said he was interested in Société Générale based on information he claims was widely known: France's leftist government of the time favoured takeovers to change the leadership at recently privatised companies. Mr Soros said he was buying stock in many companies and had no reason not to include Société Générale.
Afterward, he sold the stock, saying he felt the takeover attempt was politically motivated and was not going to benefit the company.
Mr Soros was reportedly the first American to earn a billion dollars in a single year. Born in Budapest, Hungary, in 1930, he emigrated to the United States in 1956 and became a citizen five years later. He made his fortune managing investment funds.
Forbes magazine ranked him this year as the 37th richest person in the world, with an estimated $6.9bn fortune.
Prosecutors said the case dragged on because Swiss authorities took years to respond to requests for information. Defence lawyers argued unsuccessfully that the case should be thrown out because it took so long to bring to court." "French court convicts soros of insider trading" *******
UPDATE from Budapest Times, 7/19/2009,: "Soros fighting HUF 489m fine
| Sunday, 19 July 2009 | |
The Budapest Municipal Court will hear in December the appeal of New York-based Soros Fund Management against a record HUF 489 million (EUR 1.79 million) fine handed down by the Hungarian financial regulator PSZÁF in March.
PSZÁF said the transaction led to the price of shares in Hungary’s largest domestic bank plummeting by over 14 per cent, and it went on to lose over half of its value. Soros Fund Management was set up by the Hungarian-born billionaire financier George Soros, although he no longer plays an active part in its running. The fine imposed on Soros Fund Management is the largest that the Hungarian financial regulator has ever imposed for a deal of this type. PSZÁF set the penalty at four times the profit it estimated that the firm had made from the deal."******* ***************** |
5/2/97, NY Times, Judith Miller
"Belarus has imposed a $3 million fine on the Soros Foundation for what the Government said were
currency exchange violations, apparently in an effort to shut down the country's largest independent nongovernmental organization, spokesmen for the foundation said yesterday.
The fine follows what foundation officials in New York called a monthlong campaign of harassment against the foundation, which supports educational, ecological and medical programs as well as civic groups and individuals critical of President Aleksandr G. Lukashenko's efforts to suppress opposition in the former Soviet republic of 10 million people.
Belarussian tax officials issued the fine after a monthlong audit concluded that the foundation had violated its status as a charitable organization by supporting unsanctioned opposition rallies and taken other actions that Belarus state television had earlier called ''an intervention in Belarus's domestic affairs.''
In an interview yesterday, George Soros, the American financier and a philanthropist whose money supports the foundation, called the Government's charges ''totally without merit'' and said the fine was a ''blatant attempt to close the foundation by imposing an exorbitant penalty for nonexisting infractions.''
While the foundation has appealed the Government's decision, Mr. Soros added, the fine will not be paid.
''It is not meant to be paid,'' he said. ''It is meant to close us down. And it is part of a concerted campaign by Lukashenko to consolidate his power by suppressing the independent sector in Belarus.''
The United States has been increasingly concerned about the growing authoritarianism of the Belarus President, a flamboyant former collective-farm boss who has spoken admiringly of Stalin and the virtues of dictatorship.
Last month, Mr. Lukashenko and President Boris N. Yeltsin of Russia initialed a watered-down version of a charter that paves the way for the union of the two ex-Soviet republics.
Mr. Soros, whose Open Society Institute in Moscow spent some $44 million on diverse charitable, scientific, education and democratic programs in Russia last year,
has called upon Russia to protest Mr. Lukashenko's efforts to close down his foundation in Belarus.
Mr. Lukashenko's crackdown on the Belarus Soros Foundation began in earnest in March when he ordered an investigation of all nongovernmental organizations in the country. Two other nongovernmental groups -- the United States-based City of Hope, which distributes food and clothing in Belarus, and the German-financed Chernobyl Children's Fund -- were forced to close after Belarus charged them with financial irregularities, which they, too, have denied.
Later that month,
the American executive director of the Soros Foundation was expelled after the Government charged him with interfering in domestic affairs for attending an opposition rally.
On April 23, Belarus tax inspectors concluded that 19 grants made by the Soros Foundation, including one supporting a documentary film about a small Belarussian town and another to create an archive on the 1986 Chernobyl disaster,
were not covered by the foundation's tax-exempt status.
On Wednesday, inspectors also accused the foundation of failing to comply with a Government decree requiring licensed groups to sell all hard currency holdings to the Government at the official exchange rate.
Since its creation in Minsk four years ago, the Belarus Soros Foundation has spent more than $13 million supporting the development of education, science and civic groups in Belarus."
"Belarus Fines Soros Foundation $3 million in apparent crackdown"
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