Brazillionaires
The Godfathers of Modern Brazil
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4.5 • 2 Ratings
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- £6.99
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- £6.99
Publisher Description
Longlisted for the Financial Times Business Book of the Year Award
Wealth and power on the trail of the super-rich
In 2012, Brazilian tycoon Eike Batista was the eighth richest man in the world, his $30bn fortune built on Brazil's incredible natural resources. By the middle of 2013 he had lost it all, engulfed in scandal.
Brazillionaires is a fast-paced account of Batista's rise and fall: a story of helicopter flights, beach-front penthouses and high-speed car crashes. Along the way, it tells the parallel story of Brazil itself, a country caught in the cycle of boom and bust, renewed hope and dashed promise; a country where the hyper-rich are at the heart of the economy - and where their wealth can buy immense political power.
Stefan Zweig said in 1941 that Brazil was the country of the future; Brazilians joke that it always will be. Today, rampant corruption and endemic inequality threaten to derail the new Brazilian Dream. The brazillionaires are the key to understanding that dream; through them Brazillionaires tells the story of their country's past, present and future.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Part memoir, part expos , and part historical narrative, this fascinating look at wealth in Brazil is a strong debut for Cuadros, former Bloomberg News "billionaires reporter" for Latin America. It's not surprising that a country larger in size than the United States and home to vast natural resources has become one of the world's top economies. What is surprising is Brazil's number of billionaires 54 in U.S. dollars and 150 by the Brazilian real and how quickly some got rich, such as oil magnate Eike Batista, who rapidly acquired $30 billion and then lost it all in just a year and a half. Born and raised in America, Cuadros relates his experiences as an outsider, writing that he sometimes "missed the codes" regarding issues such as race, religion, and government. While explaining how Brazil's billionaires "get rich and stay rich," he explores the role of agriculture, environmental regulations, corruption, and media. Touching on the last point, he describes how the enormous Globo TV network, owned by the billionaire Marinho family, frequently inserts didactic morals into its immensely popular telenovelas. Power is clearly the real impetus for the driven individuals profiled in the book. Readers will be eager to see what topic Cuadros tackles next.
