German Larrea Mota Velasco

◼ Origin

Germán Larrea inherited stakes in Grupo México from his father Jorge Larrea Ortega, who built the company after acquiring state-owned mines through Mexico's privatization wave under President Carlos Salinas de Gortari in the late 1980s–1990s. Germán became Executive President and turned Grupo México into the country's largest mining corporation — one of the world's largest copper producers — with operations in Mexico, the US (ASARCO), and Peru (Southern Copper). His wealth is built on hard rock and soft law: mines that produce at scale because safety and environmental compliance are treated as variables to minimize, not obligations to meet.

◼ Self-Made Verdict — YES

The record is not contested. Sixty-three miners remain entombed in a mine Grupo México declared safe 12 days before the explosion killed them — and the company stopped trying to recover their bodies 14 months later. The Sonora River still carries the legacy of 40,000 cubic meters of copper sulfate. Fifty-two workers died in a labor dispute that lasted 18 years because Larrea refused to negotiate. The Mexican Supreme Court found the reparations inadequate. No criminal prosecution has occurred. The wealth he holds was built on the bodies of workers and the poisoning of water.

◼ Documented marks