Investors Love and Hate Lula a Decade After He Made Them Very Rich

Days after Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva exited the presidential palace in Brasilia, Mohamed El-Erian, then CEO of the powerhouse bond shop Pimco, published what was in essence a love letter to him. This was January 2011, the world was in the midst of a torrid commodities boom, Brazil’s economy was soaring, and Pimco, along with scores of other investors, had just made a fortune investing in the country’s bonds.

Lula’s management style had proved so successful, El-Erian gushed in a column for Bloomberg Opinion, that it could influence political leaders everywhere, allowing “hundreds of millions of people around the world” to benefit from his presidency. “Generations of Brazilians will remember their popular president for far exceeding even the most optimistic expectations about what Brazil could achieve,” he wrote.