Edmond J. Safra (; 6 August 1932 – 3 December 1999) was a Lebanese-Brazilian banker and philanthropist who continued the family tradition of banking in Brazil and Switzerland. He was married to Lily Watkins from 1976 until his death. He died in a fire that attracted wide media interest, and was judicially determined to be due to arson.
Biography
The Safra family came from Beirut, Lebanon, and is of Sephardic Jewish background originally from Lebanon and Aleppo. Edmond's father, Jacob Safra, had opened the J. E. Safra Bank in 1920 in Beirut and in 1929 it became the Banque Jacob E. Safra which in 1956 changed its name to Banque de Credit National S.A.L. (BCN). By the time he was sixteen, Edmond Safra was working at his father's bank in Beirut, engaged in the precious metals and foreign exchange aspects of the business.
In 1949, the family moved from Lebanon to Italy, where he worked for a trading company in Milan. When he was 16, he earned $40 million during arbitrage transactions between Italian and British gold sovereigns and used this money to obtain a financial house in Geneva which became his Trade Development Bank which used only ancient Arabic script for its bookkeeping. The family moved again in 1952, this time to Brazil, where Edmond Safra and his father founded their first Brazilian financial institution in 1955. He never made Israel his residence.
Career in banking
In 1956, Edmond Safra settled in Geneva to set up a private bank, the Trade Development Bank, which grew from an original US$1 million to US$5 billion during the 1980s. He extended his financial empire to satisfy his wealthy clients from around the world. He also founded the Republic National Bank of New York in 1966, and, later, Republic National Bank of New York (Suisse) in Geneva. The Republic Bank operated 80 branches in the New York area, making it the number three branch network in the metropolitan region behind Citigroup and Chase Manhattan.
Safra's banking interests served clients in Monaco, Luxembourg and Switzerland.
From 1980 until Safra's death, Walter Weiner was Safra's attorney and CEO of Republic National Bank of New York and, in 1983, Weiner became chairman of the bank.
The sale of Trade Development Bank to American Express for more than US$450 million in 1983, turned into a legal battle between the two parties. The financier came out on top, winning a public apology from American Express for starting a smear campaign against him and US$8 million in damages, all of which he donated to charities.
In 1988, he also founded Safra Republic Holdings S.A., a Luxembourg bank holding company.
By the early 1990s, Safra's fortune was an estimated at US$2.5 billion. He was a major philanthropist during his lifetime, and he left his wealth to the Edmond J. Safra Philanthropic Foundation which supports hundreds of projects in fifty countries around the world in the areas of education, science and medicine, religion, culture and humanitarian assistance.
In 1996 Safra co-founded Hermitage Capital Management with Beny Steinmetz and Bill Browder. The hedge fund became one of the most important investment companies in Russia and later became famous in connection with the Sergei Magnitsky affair.
On 17 August 1998, Safra's Republic National Bank of New York lost 45% of its net income due its large holding of Russian bonds after the 1998 Russian financial crisis.
In 1998, Safra's bank alerted the FBI and the Swiss justice about a possible money laundering scheme involving IMF money, the Republic National Bank of New York and the Republic National Bank of New York (Suisse), some other unidentified outlets, and Russian officials of both the Russian Ministry of Finance and the Russian Central Bank. The IMF funds, which Italian newspaper la Repubblica estimated at $21.4 billion, are said to have caused the Russian financial crisis of 1998.
Later life and death
As he approached his 60s, Safra divided his time between his homes in Monaco, Geneva, and New York City and the Villa Leopolda on the French Riviera. Weakened by Parkinson's disease, he required nursing care.
On 2 December 1999, Edmond and Lily Safra gained Monegasque citizenship.
In 1999, he sold his Safra Republic Holdings and Republic New York Corporation to HSBC for $10.3 billion in cash. On 31 December 1999, HSBC Private Bank became the new name for Safra's former holdings.