111–120 of 182 posts
It's great to talk in terms of indices and devaluations and of "breaking the bank of England". The lives affected are not even spared an afterthought.
The Bank of England which was responsible for artificially pumping up the value of sterling is a more appropriate target for blame.
It's great to talk in terms of indices and devaluations and of "breaking the bank of England". The lives affected are not even spared an afterthought.
> The lives affected are not even spared an afterthought Look at it from a software perspective: there was a huge vulnerability possible. If it hadn't been exploited by this person, someone else would have. It was the Bank of England fault for not patching the exploit and creating the vulnerability.
I’ve only ever heard this line of reasoning used to justify something unethical.
And in the case of software, we don’t admire the black-hat hackers that take advantage of exploits, do we? In fact, in that case it’s not even legal…
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Appeared in multiple deranged conspiracy theories.
Well, the answer I was going to give was "he's Jewish^H^H^H^H^H^Han international globalist financier", but that's the same thing really.
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In a world where there are people that will hit you with a steel pipe and will not be stopped by the legality of the matter then it is your fault for not putting on the helmet. But that isn't a good comparison for this case as what he did was not illegal. Unlike hitting people with steel pipes.
I appreciate the honesty and consistency at least of doubling down on blaming the victim. Our pipe-wielding example will just find another victim without a helmet. You can always find something a victim could have done differently, the only common thread is the perpetrator. Also legality isn't a proxy for morality. Slavery was illegal. Some societies allowed cannibalism. What Soros did had a human cost and the fact s…
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> The lives affected are not even spared an afterthought Look at it from a software perspective: there was a huge vulnerability possible. If it hadn't been exploited by this person, someone else would have. It was the Bank of England fault for not patching the exploit and creating the vulnerability.
“If it hadn’t been exploited by this person, someone else would have” I’ve only ever heard this line of reasoning used to justify something unethical. And in the case of software, we don’t admire the black-hat hackers that take advantage of exploits, do we? In fact, in that case it’s not even legal…
That doesn't mean it's not true. Soros's actions ending the peg helped the british people, whose government was throwing away billions of pounds trying to sustain the unsustainable peg.
> Even better, Soros managed to convince other investors and investment banks (JP Morgan, Bank of America, Jones Investment, …) that the pound sterling would collapse in the event of a massive and coordinated attack. I wonder how this wouod be judged with current "insider trading" laws, but since it is a foreign country (even if ally) then probably nothing would be done. Also the article doesnt seem to mention that B…
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He's the bad guy of the story because he's a billionaire who made a $1.1Gb at the expense of the ordinary people living in the UK at the time. He forced mortgage rates, for example, to shoot up to 15%, with crippling monthly payments for a large chunk of the population. Note that the article author is a cryptocurrency cultist, so he'll be all in favour of unscrupulous people enriching themselves at the expense of oth…
> He forced mortgage rates, for example, to shoot up to 15%, with crippling monthly payments for a large chunk of the population. While this may be true, it is entirely the fault of the dumb UK mortgage market that does not provide for fixed-rate mortgages for the full term of the loan. In the US, 30 year fixed rates are the norm. In the UK you’re lucky to get 5 years fixed.
That's not an effect of the market; American 30-year fixed-rate mortgages reflect intense government involvement.
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> declaring HFT completely useless, for example. Please do ! The amount of resources invested in making HFT possible and profitable is no where close to being justified by the benefits it brings to society as a whole. Making financial information move in days instead of week ? Sure !. In hours instead of days ? Yep !. In minutes instead of hours ? Why Not !. In seconds instead of minutes ? Mmmh yeah, I guess. In mill…
Are they? Spreads have tightened massively since the advent of HFT which has knock-on effects for the small investor both in terms of cheaper personal trading and lower costs for those managing their retirement/mutual funds (see Vanguard's opinion on HFT[1]). In terms of resources, Virtu is publicly traded and has a market cap of 6.3bn, Citadel was recently valued at 22bn, the total sector is maybe 100bn. Meanwhile o…
> For many, it was obvious that the pound sterling was overvalued > The Bank of England was finally forced to give up the fight a few hours after the attack, announcing its exit from the European monetary system with a devaluation of about 15% Sounds like George Soros just fixed a disequilibrium? How is he the bad guy in this story?
He didn't do it to 'fix a disequilibrium', he ruthlessly exploited an opportunity for personal gain at the expense of an entire country. You can argue about the positive long term consequences, or the responsibility of the people that created the situation, but he is most definitely 'a' bad guy.