Soros sons helping to hedge bets

FINANCIER George Soros is handing over more control of his $12.8bn money management firm to his sons, Robert and Jonathan, who will become co-deputy chairmen of Soros Fund Management.

A memo to staff and investors also said Soros will scale back the New York-based firm's operations, spinning off three business units - real estate, credit and private equity in a restructuring.

Soros, 74, who remains chairman, hired chief executive Mark Schwartz from Goldman Sachs two years ago to expand the business.

But Schwartz told staff in the memo: 'During the past year we have worked to simplify the structure in order to return the firm to its core activity as a hedge fund manager.'

Soros's firm managed more than £20bn in the 1990s, when it ranked as the world's largest hedge fund group.

In 1992 he helped drive sterling out of the Exchange Rate Mechanism.