SOROS: The Unauthorized Biography, the Life, Times and Trading Secrets of the World's Greatest Investor (Paperback)

This review is from: SOROS: The Life, Times, and Trading Secrets of the World's Greatest Investor (Hardcover) 

Although quite out of date, this is the most interesting amongst all other bibliographies of Soros I ever read. This could be attributed to that the author could not get direct info from Soros or his associates at all. Without the burden of returning any favor, the author could quote whatever and whoever (some ex Soros partners) he liked, particularly criticisms, which were the most interesting parts of the book. Other parts, like how Soros broke the Bank of England, how he identified with his Hungarian Jewish identity, how he failed to become a philospher and turned into a trader, should be good enough to satisfy most readers' curiosity on the early part (on or before 1994) of Soro's life. For those traders who want to know the trading secrets, go somewhere else.

p.s. As a trader, I still would like to quote something from the book for my fellows' reference:-

1. Page 60: What Soros understood better than most were the cause and effect relationships in the world's economies. If A happened, that B must follow, then C after that.

2. Page 83: The stock market is always wrong, so that if you copy everybody else on Wall Street, you're doomed to do poorly.

3. Page 85: In 1979, Soros renamed his fund...Quantum Fund, in tribute to Heisenberg's uncertainty principle in quantum mechanics. That principle asserts that it is impossible to predict the behavior of subatomic particples in quantum mechanics, an idea that meshed with Soros's conviction that markets were always in a state of uncertainty and flux that it was possible to make money by discounting the obvious, and betting on the unexpected.

4. Page 92: Soros always says that you shouldnt be in the market unless you are willing to take the pain.

5. Page 110: Short term volatility is greatest at turning points and diminishes as a trend becomes established.

6. Page 159: It is not whether you are right or wrong, but how much money you make when you are right and how much money you lose when you are wrong....If you have tremendous conviction on a trade you have to go for the jugular.It takes courage to be a pig. It takes courage to ride a profit with huge leverage.... When you right on something, you cant own enough.