Brazillionaires: Wealth, Power, Decadence, and Hope in an

Brazillionaires: Wealth, Power, Decadence, and Hope in an American Country

For readers of Michael Lewis comes an engrossing tale of a countryâ€™s spectacular rise and fall, intertwined with the story of Brazilâ€™s wealthiest citizen, Eike Batistaâ€”a universal story of hubris and tragedy that uncovers the deeper meaning of this era of billionaires.

When Bloomberg News invited the young American journalist Alex Cuadros to report on Brazilâ€™s emerging class of billionaires at the height of the historic Brazilian boom, he was poised to cover two of the biggest business stories of our time: how the giants of the developing world were triumphantly taking their place at the center of global capitalism, and how wealth inequality was changing societies everywhere. The billionaires of Brazil and their massive fortunes resided at the very top of their countryâ€™s economic pyramid, and whether they quietly accumulated exceptional power or extravagantly displayed their decadence, they formed a potent microcosm of the worldâ€™s richest .001 percent.

Eike Batista, a flamboyant and charismatic evangelist for the countryâ€™s new gospel of wealth, epitomized much of this rarefied sphere: In 2012, Batista ranked as the eighth-richest person in the world, was famous for his marriage to a beauty queen, and was a fixture in the Brazilian press. His constantly repeated ambition was to become the worldâ€™s richest man and to bring Brazil along with him to the top.

But by 2015, Batista was bankrupt, his son Thor had been indicted for manslaughter, and Brazilâ€”its president facing impeachment, its provinces combating an epidemic, and its business and political class torn apart by scandalâ€”had become a cautionary tale of a country run aground by its elites.

Over the four years Cuadros was on the billionaire beat, he reported on media moguls and televangelists, energy barons and shadowy figures from the years of military dictatorship, soy barons who lived on the outskirts of the Amazon, and new-economy billionaires spinning money from speculation. He learned just how deeply they all reached into Brazilian life. They held sway over the economy, government, media, and stewardship of the environment; they determined the spiritual fates and populated the imaginations of their countrymen. Cuadrosâ€™s zealous reporting takes us from penthouses to courtrooms, from favelas to extravagant art fairs, from scenes of unimaginable wealth to desperate, massive street protests. Within a business narrative that deftly explains and dramatizes the volatility of the global economy, Cuadros offers us literary journalism with a grand sweep.

Praise for Brazillionaires

â€œA wild, richly reported taleÂ about Brazilâ€™s recent economic rise and fall, and some of the biggest, mostÂ colorful charactersÂ in business in Brazil who now have a global reach. . . . Cuadrosâ€™s story really takes off when he focuses on Eike Batista, an over-the-top one-time billionaire who became the countryâ€™s corporate mascot, only to go bankrupt in aÂ dramatic unraveling.â€â€”Andrew Ross Sorkin,Â theÂ New York Times
Â
â€œIn thisÂ excellent book [Cuadros] has managed to use billionaires to illuminate the lives of both rich and poor Brazilians, and all those in between.â€â€”The Economist

â€œBrazillionaires [is] journalist Alex Cuadrosâ€™s compelling tale of Brazilâ€™s superrich, which deftly weaves lurid soap opera with high finance and outrageous political skullduggery. . . . If Brazil sometimes comes across as a circus in this compelling, thoroughly researched account, it is because it can be just that.â€â€”The Wall Street Journal

From the Hardcover edition.

Country	USA
Author	Alex Cuadros
Binding	Kindle Edition
EISBN	9780812996777
Format	Kindle eBook
Label	Spiegel & Grau
Manufacturer	Spiegel & Grau
NumberOfPages	365
PublicationDate	2016-07-12
Publisher	Spiegel & Grau
ReleaseDate	2016-07-12
Studio	Spiegel & Grau

Brazillionaires: Wealth, Power, Decadence, and Hope in an American Country

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