A French court yesterday found financier George Soros guilty of insider trading during an almost forgotten bank takeover battle 14 years ago.
Soros was fined €2.2 million, corresponding to the profit he made on an investment in Société Générale in 1988.
The affair involving an abortive stock market raid by French financier Georges Pebereau to buy control of Société Générale in 1988 implicated several businessmen and caused turmoil in French politics and the Paris business community at the time.
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." After the case, Soros supporters alluded to a possible anti-American bias by highlighting that he was the only US citizen facing charges.
At first 11 people were placed under formal investigation. Mr Pebereau, the initiator of the raid, and Marc Vienot, the former head of Société Générale, whose house was this week raided by investigators probing the near-bankruptcy of Vivendi Universal, received amnesties in 1995.
Charges against five others were dropped over the years.
The case took 14 years to come to trial because of delays securing information from the Netherlands, Britain, Luxembourg and Switzerland.
Defence lawyers said the delay infringed the European human rights' convention.
