Last year, Brazilian commodities tycoon Eike Baptista, was ranked as the world’s eighth richest person with a net worth of $34.5 billion.
His net worth today is just $200 million, according to Bloomberg Billionaires.
Batista, who has been called the Donald Trump of Brazil, may have suffered one of the “worst wealth loss in history,” says Matt Miller, Bloomberg Billionaires Index editor.
“He was the face of Brazilian capitalism. He’s mired in debt. This is a tragic fall for him.”
Most of Batista’s problems occured from the erosion of nearly 90% of the value in his flagship company, OGX Petroleo & Gas Participacoes SA (OGXP3).
Shares in the business have plummeted in the last year as the company missed targets for production output and reserves.
Yesterday, Mubadala Development Co., a sovereign-wealth fund out of Abu Dhabi, converted an investment in Batista’s companies into debt, further eroding the value of his overall assets.
EBX Group Co., Batista’s commodities empire, now owes $1.5 billion to Mubadala. And that put Batista over the edge, reducing his personal wealth to millions, not billions anymore.
Miller says he “tended to oversell the amount of resources it had,” and that Batista would have to “constantly borrow against one company to pay for the needs of others.”
Unlike billionaires Bill Gates and Warren Buffett, Batista was ostentatious about his wealth and even declared that he would overtake Mexico’s Carlos Slim for the world’s richest person title by the year 2015.
He told Bloomberg: “Just give me time, let me work please.”
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