AFP reported on March 27:
Hungary’s financial supervisory watchdog announced Friday it had slapped a 1.6-million-euro fine on an investment fund founded by US billionaire George Soros, for manipulating the market.
Soros and NLPC President Peter Flaherty have clashed over Soros’ business ethics. During October 2004, Soros undertook a pro-John Kerry media and speaking tour. NLPC trailed Soros with its own “Soros Truth Squad.”
In Harrisburg, Pennsylvania on October 21, Flaherty asked Soros how he could come to Pennsylvania, “where corporate scandals have cost people their jobs,” to tell working people how to vote in light of his conviction for insider trading in France.
Soros denied that he was convicted, and instead attacked NLPC as “Orwellian.” Flaherty followed up by asking why Soros had been fined $2 million, if he had not been convicted. Soros claimed he had not been fined.
Soros apparently misled the media and the audience of 200 people. Numerous news organizations in the U.S. and Europe had reported that Soros was convicted of insider trading in December 2002 and fined $2.2 million. Furthermore, Soros had previously admitted that he was convicted. In a September 12, 2003 interview on the PBS show “Now With Bill Moyers,” Soros told reporter David Brancaccio, “I was found guilty.”
Soros’ contention in Harrisburg that he had not been convicted was apparently based on the fact that the case was under appeal. In France, a suspect is technically considered innocent until all appeals are exhausted. In June 2006, this fig leaf fell away as France’s highest court upheld Soros’ conviction.