INVESTMENT FUNDS

In short, he still wanted answers to all those existential questions
that had teased him as a student in London in the early 1950s.
The reporter asked him if he had a cutoff point, presumably meaning
retirement.
Soros answered in the negative: “I think that would be a kind of a
defeat. But I would like to keep things within certain bounds so that
I don’t come to that stage. There is clearly a moment when it could
become too much and I wouldn’t be able to cope with it.”
Did he ever feel used? All people with large amounts of money felt
that way at one time or another. Did Soros?
“No. I feel that I am reasonably good at identifying this risk and
avoiding it. I accept it as part of the game.”
Reporter: “You talk about the responsibility of having so much
money, and dealing with it in such a way that you are not seen as a
gross self-seeker. Is that a difficult thing?”
Soros: “I don’t really care about that. I am sure that story will be
written, if it has not been done already. I don’t think I have anything to
defend. I think the problem is elsewhere. Am I a slave of my success,
or am I in charge of my destiny?
“There is such a thing as being too successful and having too much
to do to be successful. I need to achieve the right balance and not be
swept away by my own success. I must not be sucked into something that
is beyond me. That is the real game of my life, because that is the risktaking
part.”

INVESTING MONEY

Television crews from England and the United States requested his
cooperation for short documentaries on his career. For the first time,
he gave them permission to film in his investment offices in New York
and in the Budapest cellars where he had hid from the Nazis.
For Soros, it was certainly worthwhile. In an ABC-TV documentary
that aired on December 13, 1993, he said: “[My fund] has become
so enormous that it doesn’t make sense unless I have a use for the
money…. It seems to be easier [to make money than to spend it]. I seem
to have a greater facility in making it than in making the right decisions
in giving it away.”
No more identity crises overtook him. Soros seemed a most satisfied
individual. Still, he yearned for more from life, as he made clear in a
remarkable interview he gave to Leadership magazine in July 1993. The
reporter asked him how he saw himself at this point?
Soros: “I am a work in progress and I am rather satisfied with the
curve that events have taken. I like myself a great deal better than I did
when I was purely on the moneymaking side. Now I feel more complete….
If I could just progress towards a better understanding of how
it all hangs together it would give me great satisfaction.”