2023-11-06 13:25:25
Monday, November 6, 2023, 11:26 | Updated 12:25 p.m.
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Euskadi maintains its representation in the Forbes list of the richest Spaniards of the last year. As in 2022, there are six Basque businessmen on the list. And one more year, the Guipuzcoan Daniel Maté (San Sebastián, 1963) is the only one who manages to ‘sneak’ into the ‘top 10’ with a net worth that reaches 2.9 billion euros in the market. He is the seventh richest in the country although he loses 200 million euros compared to last year.
Other well-known faces of Basque society who remain on the Forbes list are Jose María Aristrain, Juan Luis Arregui, Víctor de Urrutia and Carmen Ybarra. The Basque businessman Fernando Romero, founder of the renewable company Energy, Innovation and Photovoltaic Development (EiDF), leaves this list after occupying position number 34 with assets that reached 850 million euros in market value in 2022 However, Alejandro Aznar Sainz, owner of the Ibaizabal and Marqués del Riscal group, enters the list. He does so in 100th place with a net worth of 350 million euros.
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At the national level, there are no major changes to the Forbes list. Amancio Ortega continues to be the richest person in Spain for another year. The founder of Inditex has assets of almost 82,000 million, 52% more than last year. He is followed by his daughter Sandra, as the second largest fortune, Rafael del Pino (Ferrovial), Juan Carlos Escotet (Abanca) and Juan Roig (Mercadona).
The richest in Euskadi in 2023
Glencore shareholder 2.9 billion euros (-€200 million)
Daniel Maté (rank number 7)
Daniel Mate. At number 7. Assets: 2,900 million euros (200 less than last year). Glencore shareholder (mining). He is the third shareholder of the Anglo-Swiss multinational metals and mining company. In recent months, he has taken advantage of the company’s stock market rally to get rid of positions, although his other investments in Rossberg Inmobilien AG, Wildspitz SL and Gran Vía 60 SL have caused his assets to decrease in volume. According to a notification to the British regulator, its participation has already fallen below 3%.
Maté was born in San Sebastián in 1963. In 1988, after graduating in Economic Law in Deusto, he moved to Madrid to work at Marc Rich & Co, a company dedicated to metals and oil brokerage. Only six years later he participated in the operation in which several directors bought part of the firm’s assets from magnate Marc Rich. There was born Glencore, which in 2013 merged with the British Xstrata to become the most important exploiter and operator of raw materials, from oil to zinc, including copper, cobalt and coal.
Maté’s fortune became public when Glencore began trading on the London and Hong Kong stock exchanges in 2011. At that time he owned 6% of the firm, but the merger with Xstrata and a capital increase in 2015 reduced his stake to 3.5% current. The value of this has fluctuated in recent years (1,200 million in 2020 compared to 2,200 now), first downwards due to the impact of the pandemic on the industry and now upwards due to the rise in oil or coal prices.
In fact, Glencore shares have increased their value by 240% since last year and this summer it announced historic profits of 11,882 million euros in the first half of 2022 compared to 1,256 in the same period of the previous year. A figure that barely makes a dent in the 1.5 billion that it will have to pay after reaching different agreements with the authorities of the United States, Great Britain and Brazil after acknowledging several accusations of bribery and market manipulation in African and Latin American countries.
Not much has emerged about his family life. He is married to Luisa Leza and they have two children, both born in Switzerland: David and Gabriela. He has founded several companies in the online commerce sector such as RedBid or Recomy and she is a professional rider.
Arcelor-Mittal shareholder €1.1 billion (=)
José María Aristrain (36)
José María Aristrain At number 36. He is one of the main shareholders of the steel company Arcelor-Mittal, with a 2% stake (409 million). His shares fell below 8 euros in 2020, although they later exceeded 20 euros again. Aristrain also has 10% of shares in Tubacex (37.4 million), the world’s second largest manufacturer of seamless stainless steel tubes. A wealthy heir, he amassed luxury cars and faced charges for 15 tax crimes in September 2015. He was accused of feigning residence in Switzerland, hiding money in Luxembourg and defrauding €210.9 million between 2005 and 2009.
Acquitted last year in the largest tax fraud trial in the history of Spain, he has once again won a battle against the Treasury. This time, the Madrid Court has not considered it sufficiently proven that ‘the steel magnate’ bought a home in 2012 owned by a company of which he was the sole director in order, according to the Tax Agency, to avoid paying VAT on the reform and prevent it from being seized as part of the bail established in the case opened for the alleged non-payment of 211 million euros in taxes.
The Court recognizes that there are anomalies in the operation, but does not see in it the intention to hinder the work of the public ministry, as the Prosecutor’s Office claimed, because “there is no logic in trying to carry out a search with an asset that is transmitted to the administrator of the society”. Quite a setback for the Treasury, which in 2011 turned a man until then almost as anonymous as he was rich into its number one enemy.
Presidente de Ence
780 M€ (+30M€)
Juan Luis Arregui (48)
Juan Luis Arregui. At number 48. President of Ence (paper). Assets: 780 million euros (30 more than last year). He is president and majority shareholder of Ence, of which he owns 29.44%. He has, on the other hand, 0.57% of Iberdrola. Between the two they add up to 611 million euros. Ence fell on the stock market by more than 50% between 2018 and 2021, and after recovering 35% in 2022, it has risen almost 8% in 2023.
Juan Luis Arregui (Mallabia, 1944), was founder and former president of Gamesa, as well as vice president of Iberdrola between 2006 and 2010. This businessman from Biscay studied at the Bilbao Higher Technical School of Engineering. Later, he graduated in Numerical Control from Wandsdorf (Germany) and has a Master’s degree in MicroMechanical Engineering from Besançon (France).
Arregui’s business journey is long. In 1975 he founded Numerical Torneados and a year later, Numerical Mechanizations to make non-cylindrical parts. Ten years later, in 1985, he created Robotecsa. When he founded Gamesa – where he was president between 1976 and 1995 – he did so with a subcontracting strategy and management based on the commitment of a multitude of suppliers. “We were 20 people but we mobilized more than a hundred small businesses and more than a thousand professionals.” He came to work for the Airbus consortium in France. The project was to manufacture safe carbon fiber wings, but it did not go ahead. “It was the biggest momentary disappointment of my life.”
Despite this “disappointment”, he convinced Brazilian businessmen to work with Embraer, the world’s third largest manufacturer of military, medium-range commercial and executive aircraft. At that time Gamesa was no longer an SME, but became a leading multinational that later delved into wind energy.
Owner of Onchena Inversiones €570 M (+€270 M)
Carmen Ybarra (69)
Carmen Ybarra and family. Number 69. Owner of Onchena (Investments). Assets: 570 million euros (270 more than last year). She is the 89% owner of the Onchena holding, with which she has stakes in Vocento, Atrys, Ecoener, Reig and Solarpack among other investments. The complete valuation of this company is 572 million euros. Carmen Ybarra received the marquisate of Arriluce from her father and her investments from her mother.
The Ybarra Careaga family, with roots in the Neguri neighborhood of Getxo, directs the investment arm of Onchena, present in business groups such as MásMóvil, Elecnor, Ecoener, Laboratorio Reig Jofre, Iberpapel and Vocento. Currently, its investments in the stock market, made through the Onchena fund, are estimated at around 600 million euros distributed in diversified reference companies in a dozen areas, among which the health sector stands out, with Atrys Health and Reig Jofre Laboratories; energy, with Arteche Lantegui; technology, with Agile Content; the real estate sector, with Vitrubio Real State and Inversa Prime; the industrial, with Ingotes Especiales, Nicolás Correa and NBI Bearings; or agroforestry, with Ecolumber.
Owner of Asua Investments 490 M€ (-160 M€)
Victor de Urrutia Vallejo (72)
Victor de Urrutia Vallejo and son. Number 72. Owners of Asua (Investments). Assets: 490 million euros (160 less than last year. Víctor de Urrutia, of Basque descent, but born in Madrid, is a relevant investor through Asua Inversiones. Urrutia is the majority shareholder of the Riojan winery Compañía Vinícola del Norte ( CVNE) and the SICAV Profitability 2009. He is also a minority shareholder in Iberdrola, Rovi and Proeduca. The Valencian businessman José Ignacio Comenge is his partner in CVNE with 17%.
In 1978 he became the youngest director of Iberdrola: he is the grandson of the founder of Hidroeléctrica Ibérica and Hidroeléctrica Española, the origin of the great company.
Owner of the Ibaizabal Group and Marqués de Riscal €350 M
Alejandro Aznar Sainz (100)
Alejandro Aznar Sainz and family. Number 100. Owner of the Ibaizabal group and Marqués de Riscal. Assets: 350 million euros. Alejandro Aznar Sainz, along with his family, has one of the oldest fortunes on the list, heir to the Naviera Aznar, founded in 1860 by his great-great-grandfather Eduardo Aznar y de la Sota, bankrupt in the 80s of the 20th century and refounded as Ibaizabal . Alejandro has been leading the Marqués de Riscal wineries in Elciego (Álava) for 29 years, where his family has a controlling position.
It has one of the largest hunting farms in the Cabañeros National Park, in the municipality of Retuerta del Bullaque (Ciudad Real), with 6,330 hectares.
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