[fmvab]

“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…

[colinmhayes]

> I’ve only ever heard this line of reasoning used to justify something unethical.

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.

[fmvab]

Perhaps the outcome was better for Britain in the end, but I object to glorifying Soros on the grounds that his intentions were clearly to take money out of the system, and breaking the pound with a coordinated attack just doesn’t seem very ethical.

I also think that when people characterize moves like this as ‘brilliant’ it does a disservice to the word. I think many folks, if they tuned their attention to opportunities like this, had the big name firms in their Rolodex, and had questionable ethics, could have made this move. Maybe I’m missing it, but this seems like a pretty straightforward way to take advantage of the system.

[colinmhayes]

I really don't think intentions matter when contemplating moral questions, outcomes matter. Every economist was saying the peg would be broken, yet the bank of england was committed to throwing away money trying to save it. Every day they continued the british people were worse off. Soros was a hero in this story for being the person who convinced the bank of england to end their fools errand.

[psd1]

That's begging the question. Clearly someone thought that Britain would be better off in the ERM at that rate, and clearly some economists thought the rate could be maintained