The financier George Soros, the billionaire investor and liberal donor, has handed control of his multi-billion-dollar foundation to his son, Alexander.
The 92-year-old, who memorably made $1bn betting against the British pound and “breaking the Bank of England” in a catastrophic financial event in 1992 that became known as Black Wednesday, had said previously that he did not want his Open Society Foundations (OSF) to be taken over by any of his five children.
However, Soros has now named his son Alexander as chairman of one of the wealthiest global philanthropic foundations. “He’s earned it,” said Soros, whose personal fortune is valued at $6.7bn.
The 37-year-old, who was quietly appointed in December, said he was “more political” than his father and that he planned to continue donating family money to left-leaning US political candidates, in an interview with the Wall Street Journal on Sunday.
His father has been one of the biggest donors to Democratic candidates in US politics.
“We are going to double down on defending voting rights and personal freedom at home and supporting the cause of democracy abroad,” said Alexander. “As much as I would love to get money out of politics, as long as the other side is doing it, we will have to do it too.”
Alexander, who earlier this week tweeted a picture of himself posing with the US vice-president, Kamala Harris, now directs political activity as president of his father’s political action committee.
The foundation, of which Alexander has been deputy chair since 2017, directs about $1.5bn a year to groups such as those backing human rights and helping to build democracies.
Alexander, who studied history at New York University and earned a PhD from the University of California, Berkeley, has pursued his own initiatives including backing progressive Jewish organisations, environmental causes and workers’ rights in the US.
He also sits on the investment committee of the foundation that oversees Soros Fund Management (OSF), with the vast majority of the $25bn in assets under management belonging to the OSF. The OSF received $18bn from his father in 2018.
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“With my background, there are a lot of ways I could have gone astray,” said Alexander. “Instead I became a workaholic, and my life is my work.”
George Soros has married three times and has five children: Alexander, Andrea, Gregory, Robert and Jonathan.
