Book reveals the history of the Safra bank and the death of Edmond in Monaco

"Os Safras: Uma História", by reporter Robson Viturino, is in bookstores. Tells the story of Safra bank. Tremendous story. There were three brothers —Edmond, José and Moise— who created a bank with the family surname. They triumphed, they fought (in their own style), they found themselves involved in a crime, in which Edmond died.

In 2015, José Safra was the richest banker in the world. He beat Rothschild, Warburg, Morgan, Goldman, Rockefeller, Setúbal and Moreira Salles. All of this in a simple and discreet way, in just over 50 years.

José died in 2020, always erasing his footprints, except in philanthropy. His bank financed tucanos and PT members, helped create Cebrap (Brazilian Center for Analysis and Planning), which in 1969 welcomed professors dismissed from USP (University of São Paulo), listening to the then Minister of Economy, Delfim Netto. Reserved, the Safras were old-style bankers, in a world that no longer exists, that of numbered accounts in Switzerland.

Viturino went into the Safra secrets, not all of them, but those that make his book a revealing work. At the heart of the mysteries is Edmond's death in December 1999 in Monaco. Saddled with Parkinson's disease, he was in his penthouse when he feared being kidnapped and locked himself and a nurse in a bathroom. A nurse set fire to a waste basket and the two died of asphyxiation from the smoke.

Viturino does not decipher the mystery, but shows the frame. A sample:

"Much would be said about the moment when José and Moise appeared at the Hekhal Haness synagogue and chairs had to be taken to them —through the synagogue, as their names were not on the guest list—, all under the widow's icy disapproving gaze.(...) At Edmond's burial in the Veyrier cemetery, José and Moise had to elbow their way through the procession to be able to carry their brother's coffin."

That. The two brothers got along very, very badly with Lily Safra. She would go on to become the richest woman in the world. In 2008, Lily sold Villa Leopolda, where she hosted parties with Edmond, for US$530 million, the highest value of a property since the Stone Age.

José stepped away from Edmond's business before his death. Afterwards, José and Moise separated. Today the two banks, Safra and J. Safra, are on the two sidewalks of Avenida Paulista, on the corner of Rua Augusta.