Rafaela Diamant Pinas Aponte and the “self-made woman” richest in the world and is at the head of a billionaire empire: the MSC, the Mediterranean Shipping Company the largest shipping company in the world by container capacity.
Rafaela Aponte, who is the richest woman in the world
Rafaela Diamant Pinas Aponte, daughter of an Israeli banker based in Switzerland, is a strong and determined woman. She and she is the woman without whom MSC would not have had the success it has.
She knows her husband Gianluigi Aponte for the first time in the 1960s, during a boat trip to Capri. He, originally from nearby Sant’Agnello, he was the captain of a ship that transported tourists from Naples. A meeting that has kept them together ever since. In fact, very soon he joined her in Geneva by accepting a job as a broker at a local bank.
Rafaela Aponte, daughter of a Swiss-based Israeli banker, is the woman without whom MSC would not have been as successful as it was (Getty Images)
From a freighter to success
The professional history that binds them is very beautiful: the idea is to set up a shipping company together that could sail the seas of the whole world. But, without overdoing it, the two begin requesting and obtaining a loan of 200 thousand dollars and with this money they buy the first ship, a small freighter that will be called Patricia.
But the dream is to grow bigger and so the couple launches MSC in Geneva: from that moment they bought more and more boats, arriving to have up to 17 only in 1979.
The strength and determination of Rafaela Aponte
The adventure has started and will never stop: over the years MSC has grown to become one of the largest shipping companies in the world, expanding its business to cruisesbecoming one of the largest cruise lines in the world and then in 2000 to the container terminal businesswith the same success.
A story of love and business
Gianluigi and Rafaela are always together today and they are always the only shareholders with a 50% stake each. With them there is also their son Diego who is President of the company while Gianluigi is Executive President.
Rafaela serves on the board of directors and is responsible for decorating cruise ships and although he has no formal position within the MSC empire, without her Gianluigi would not have reached where he is.
Indeed, his wife was fundamental to the growth of the company: «His role was decisive» and if the man who in 1970 lent the Apontes the money for the purchase of their first ship, Dominique Denat, says so, we have to believe him.
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