>>9725858
example article from 2009, some of the snapshots are missing, I have no idea why.
Soros Convicted of Insider Trading in France
April 22, 2009 by Elizabeth Crum
Filed under Front Page Stories
The telling of this story may seem past due, but it took the French courts over fifteen years to convict George Soros on insider trading charges. The 2002 conviction, upheld by France’s highest court in 2006, was based on Soros’ 1988 purchase of stakes in four state-owned companies based on confidential, insider information.
One of these companies was Société Générale, the subject of a takeover bid. Soros had been invited to participate in the takeover by a Paris financier and had become privy to key details of the transaction. He passed up the deal, then promptly snatched up 95,000 SG shares.
Soros has acknowledged that he was told about plans to take over SG and that he began acquiring shares a few days later, while denying that his knowledge of the deal amounted to insider information or that it influenced his transactions. But Denys Millet, the prosecutor in the French case, said that “Stripped down to its essentials, this information was confidential and prohibited all operations for those who had it.”
Soros was fined 2.2 million euro, the same amount he gained from his insider knowledge of the bid for Société Générale. The takeover bid was, in the end, unsuccessful, and Soros maintains his innocence by claiming that the knowledge he had in this case was not confidential.
After the conviction Soros stated that he would appeal this case at the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg. Soros argued that the fourteen year period between his purchase and conviction denied him the opportunity for a fair trial. He also claimed the French law against insider trading was vague.
This is yet another instance in which the billionaire speculator exhibited a complete disregard for the laws of a foreign country and then refused to take responsibility for his actions.