Soros pledges $50 million to aid NYC's poor |
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Date: Thursday, May 14, 2009
Author: Svea Herbst-Bayliss, Reuters
Billionaire
hedge fund manager
and philanthropist
George Soros has promised to donate $50 million to a
foundation that helps poor New Yorkers.
But there is a catch.
Soros, who runs Soros
Fund Management LLC and is one of the industry's most
successful investors, said the Robin Hood Foundation must raise about $150
million in the next two years. He made the pledge at the foundation's annual
gala in New York.
The foundation was created two decades ago by
hedge fund
manager Paul Tudor Jones to assist New York City's poor by sending money to
groups that fight homelessness and aid education.
The foundation raised $72.7 million at the event, where Wall Street bankers
mingled with
Hollywood stars like Tom Hanks and Anne Hathaway and Oprah
Winfrey. They were serenaded by Aretha Franklin.
Soros, who at 78 years old ranks as one of the hedge fund industry's
elder statesmen, has spent more time in
recent years giving away some of his personal fortune.