The direct income that he'll receive from this book won't even register as a tenth of a percent on his income statement. So clearly, he's not doing it for pure sensationalism. I actually think he believes what he's saying.
Yes, yes, but the parent commenter is right in spirit. Soros is richer than god, so he's working to satisfy other ambitions now. From the economist article mentioned below:
The 77-year-old hedge-fund supremo and slayer of sterling has nothing to prove financially (he is worth upwards of $8 billion). Intellectually, however, he has long been frustrated at not being taken seriously. Just as he was about to give up, along came a debacle that, he believes, validates his Weltanschauung.
That fits pretty well with the carefully hidden acknowledgement that this isn't news:
And yet this is not the first time that Mr. Soros has prophesied doom. In 1998, he published a book predicting a global economic collapse that never came.
This article is about two things: the general hysteria of a generation of workers who have never seen a real recession; and a rich man in his final years trying to leverage his wealth into a legacy. They're both pandering.
The direct income that he'll receive from this book
Two commenters now seem to think that Soros wants to sell books for money. No, he's going for his shot of glory--the guy who predicted the apocolypse. Trouble is, everyone's doing that lately...
He's going a lot further than the rest: acknowledging that the fundamental driver of economic growth for the past few decades (cheap money) is unsustainable.
Most people are predicting bad things about the housing market and the credit system, but stopping short of analyzing the implications; Soros is one of the few people taking the next logical step.
Soros is saying that "cheap money" in the US has been caused by a ponzi-scheme in US asset markets. Capital inflows pushed up prices and attracted more investment, which pushed up prices and attracted more investment... Now that people are taking money out prices will fall and obliterate a lot of wealth that exists only on paper.
There's no question that what he's describing has happened. The real uncertainty is over the scale. This could be very significant, or it could be insignificant. Soros is implying that this sort of speculative investment dominates US markets and is the reason the USD hasn't followed fundamentals for the last ten years.
Not much mention of this in the news, but Hong Kong and Singapore have just adjusted their basket peg to the USD. Reduced demand for USD by major debt-holders means reduced demand for USD assets.
Unlikely. Debt we owe china is leverage we have over them. If they tried to use it for political purposes, all we need to do is say "we're not paying." For bonus points, we can also say "100% tariffs on chinese goods."
All of a sudden, $900 billion of China's assets are toast. This will hurt their credit rating as much as ours (do they have any collateral anymore?).
Debt between nations is not the same as debt you owe to the bank.
Plus I don't think he can be faulted for thinking a recession was coming the first time he predicted it - maybe the signs were there that one was coming, but just didn't happen, or was delayed until now when it will finally hit harder.
It's testable in the long run. Considering he wants to be remembered as an intellectual, it'd be a bad move to purposefully make a big claim that's quite likely to be false.
As for selling books, the guy's one of the richest people in the world...
He makes a fantastic prediction. 10% chance he is remembered forever (he predicted a black swan, what foresight!), 90% chance of nothing.
He makes no fantastic predictions, just "the future will probably be much like the present". 0% chance he is remembered forever (he predicted no major change, big whoop).
10% > 0%.
It may be a very good move to make big, ridiculous claims.
Only if he attaches a specific time frame to the prediction. In the long run, "we're headed for doomsday" is a tautology, if only because of the eventual heat death of the universe. But unless you can say "Doomsday will happen in the first quarter of 2012, and the market will continue rising until then", it's not much of a prediction. A broken clock is right twice a day.
> How to sell books: attach vague, untestable doomsday claims to it
Perhaps true now, but not true three years ago. Three years ago all the people who saw a crisis brewing were completely ignored. If you wanted popular attention you had to crow about making fast money in finance or by flipping houses.
