Biography
Rafaela Aponte-Diamant and her husband Gianluigi each own a 50% stake in MSC, the world's largest shipping line.
Rafaela first met Gianluigi on a trip to the Italian island of Capri in the 1960s, when Gianluigi was a ship captain.
They entered the shipping industry together in 1970, when they purchased a ship with a $200,000 loan.
MSC also operates in holiday cruises (MSC Cruises), inland logistics (Medlog) and port operations (Terminal Investment Limited.)
Rafaela is responsible for decorating ships for MSC Cruises; Gianluigi is MSC's executive chairman and their son, Diego, is MSC's president.
Perspective on their fortune
Gold
Everyday luxury
A Rafaela Aponte-Diamant's fortune is equivalent to 294 of gold, but this may be difficult to value, as we don't usually have a handful of gold bars in our piggy bank.
A standard gold ring typically weighs between 4 and 7 grams. Let's say this one weighs 5 grams. It's usually 18k gold.
Based on today's gold price (not taking into account the jeweler's fee, shipping, or anything else), that gold ring would be worth $556.3
Rafaela Aponte-Diamant could buy 78,416,837 gold rings. That's a lot of fingers and a lot of gifts!!
And if the number of rings is difficult to visualize, all these rings would need 14 trucks to transport them, But we can be almost certain that Rafaela Aponte-Diamant will have enough left over to pay for the gas for those trucks.
Health
The price of life
Let's compare Rafaela Aponte-Diamant's fortune with the healthcare spending of a huge country
Rafaela Aponte-Diamant could fund the entire healthcare system of DR Congo with a population of over 105,800,000 of inhabitants for approximately 19.6 years.
But even if we compare their fortune to that of a rich country
At the other extreme, Rafaela Aponte-Diamant could cover the health expenditure of Luxembourg, considered the world's most heavily invested health system, for 8.7 years
Education
Buying the future
Lowest education spending
Rafaela Aponte-Diamant could assume the entire cost of the education system of Nigeria, the most populous country in Africa, with more than 243,000,000 inhabitants for 12.8 years.
Highest education spending
But not only could he assume the cost of a poor country, Luxembourg is considered the country with the highest per capita investment in education in the world, Rafaela Aponte-Diamant could pay for it in full for 17.4 years.
Research
The monopoly of progress
Lowest research spending
Rafaela Aponte-Diamant could fully fund the state research budget of Pakistan, the fifth most populous country in the world with more than 260,000,000 of inhabitants, for 73.4 years.
Highest research spending
But even if we compare the total wealth of Rafaela Aponte-Diamant with Israel, the country that currently invests the most per capita in research in the world, it could assume the total cost of the system for 1.6 years.
Financial Assets
Monthly wealth history
Fortune comparison
Historical data not available for comparison