Financier Soros fined £1.4m for insider trading

The billionaire financial speculator George Soros was fined €2.2m (£1.4m) by a French court yesterday after being found guilty of insider trading.

Soros, 72, traded shares of the French bank Société Générale SA during a takeover battle 14 years ago. He is expected to appeal against conviction on the ground that the prosecution was unfairly delayed and that his speculation was legitimate.

Two other men accused of insider trading in the same case were acquitted last month.

Soros, 72, president of Soros Fund Management LLC, the world's largest hedge fund, has made a fortune estimated at $6.9bn (£4.3bn) with spectacular investments on financial markets and stock exchanges.

He made an estimated $1bn (£600m) in 1992 by correctly forecasting that sterling would be forced to devalue and leave the European exchange rate mechanism. Born in Hungary and partly educated in Britain, he moved to the United States in 1956. According to Forbes magazine, he is the 37th richest person in the world.

The case arises from an attempt by a French investment bank in 1988 to take over Société Générale, whose shares were in the doldrums after privatisation the previous year.

A court hearing last month was told that Soros had been asked by the investment bank Marceau Investissement to join the takeover. He declined but, it was alleged, bought up large quantities of Société Générale shares, profiting from his inside knowledge of the takeover plans.

In his defence, Soros argued that the 14-year delay in bringing the prosecution was unreasonable. He also argued it was general knowledge that a change of government in France in spring 1988 would lead to takeover bids against Société Générale and other recently privatised financial institutions. He admitted talking to Marceau Investissement about a possible takeover for Société Générale but said he had also discussed a range of other obvious targets.

His lawyers argued that in 1988 the offence of "insider trading" was restricted in France to the use of inside knowledge by directors and employees buying and selling shares in their own companies. Even under tighter laws introduced in 1990 it was far from clear that Soros had committed any offence.