Brazilian economist Luiz Barsi in Sao Paulo, October 17, 2023 (AFP/Nelson ALMEIDA)
For Brazilian Luiz Barsi, being rich was not an end in itself: above all, he wanted “not to become poor again”. At 84, he is at the head of an immense fortune amassed through judicious investments in the stock market.
Shoe shiner when he was a child, Luiz Barsi is today nicknamed the “Brazilian Warren Buffett”, in reference to the famous American tycoon, for his exceptional ability to invest in the financial market.
According to Forbes magazine, the “King of Dividends”, the title of his autobiography published last year, has accumulated a fortune of 4 billion reais (around 750 million euros).
Always very active, this smiling octogenarian says he is “addicted” to work: “the wheel can’t stop turning, otherwise I go back to who I was,” he confides to AFP.
Born in Sao Paulo, the only son of descendants of European immigrants, he was just one year old when his father died. Until he was twenty, he lived with his mother in a working-class pension in the working-class district of Bras.
“Every time I returned to this pension, I told myself that I desperately needed to change my life,” he said in his memoirs.
Without ever neglecting his studies, he sold sweets at the cinema, shined shoes and was a handyman in a company, before obtaining degrees in Law, Economics and Accounting.
– “Control your ego” –
When Luiz Barsi made his first investments, more than half a century ago, he had just divorced his first wife and had four children to support (he later had a daughter from his second marriage).
Brazilian economist Luiz Barsi in Sao Paulo, October 17, 2023 (AFP/Nelson ALMEIDA)
“I needed to find new ways to make money, even if I didn’t have much to invest,” he says.
Currently, he earns around 1 million reais per day (around 190,000 euros) just from the dividends paid by the companies in which he is a shareholder, estimates his daughter Louise, who founded a platform teaching her father’s methods and was also present during the interview with AFP.
Dressed in a simple striped polo shirt, he is not the type to flaunt his fortune, amassed since the days when shares were sold by auction on the Sao Paulo stock exchange in the late 1960s. According to him, a good investor must “control his ego”.
Luiz Barsi sees himself as a “small owner” of companies in which he is a shareholder, going against the tide of “speculators who have transformed the Stock Exchange into a casino”.
According to him, most of the nearly five million people who invest money in the Sao Paulo Stock Exchange only aim for short-term capital gains.
“No one becomes rich overnight,” summarizes the multimillionaire.
The keys to his success have been “discipline” and “few mistakes made”, as well as a good dose of patience, he says.
Louise Barsi, daughter of Brazilian economist Luiz Barsi, during an interview with AFP, October 17, 2023 in Sao Paulo (AFP/Nelson ALMEIDA)
His method: form a portfolio with a large quantity of shares purchased at low cost, in “perennial” sectors such as energy or banks, provided that these companies pay dividends.
He advises against fixed-rate bonds, which he considers unprofitable, or cryptocurrencies, “a fantasy”.
– “Too many taxes” –
This method has allowed it to emerge unscathed from the numerous periods of instability in the Brazilian economy in recent decades.
“I never trust governments, just the market, it’s one of the keys to my success,” he assures.
Brazilian economist Luiz Barsi in Sao Paulo, October 17, 2023 (AFP/Nelson ALMEIDA)
Called on several occasions to enter politics, he always refused: “I like money, not positions” of responsibility.
Luiz Barsi is very critical of the last governments in place, including that of ex-far-right president Jair Bolsonaro (2019-2022), although he is well regarded in business circles.
He nevertheless finds him “less worse” than his left-wing successor Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, according to him “become an emperor rather than a president” since his return to power in January.
“In Brazil, there are too many taxes,” he sighs, not hiding his concern about bills being debated in Parliament which aim to tax the “super-rich” and offshore companies. , as well as dividends paid to shareholders.
© 2023 AFP
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