Currency traders are ‘unscrupulous profiteers’ and ‘immoral’, says Malaysian ex PM

(July 6): As the Asian financial crisis raged on two decades ago, Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad committed economic heresy by rejecting an International Monetary Fund bailout and slapping capital controls on global investors.

Mahathir blasted currency traders as "unscrupulous profiteers" in an "immoral" line of work. Billionaire hedge fund manager George Soros, who bet big and won big against the British pound in 1992, returned fire, predicting that Mahathir’s policies would be a "recipe for disaster."

Not so it turned out. Malaysia’s economy contracted but quickly snapped back from the crisis. Mahathir’s controls were defended early on by Nobel Laureate Paul Krugman and with the passage of time even the IMF and World Bank have warmed up to the measures.

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