Including financial analysts, traders and less traditional profiles, there are more than 1,250 "finfluencers" in Brazil, one of the world's biggest social media-using countries, according to a recent report by financial industry group ANBIMA
Influencer Murilo Duarte streams a live video at the Jardim JoĂ£o XXIII slum in Sao Paulo, Brazil, on April 19, 2023.
Image: Miguel Schincariol / AFP©
With his tattooed arms, drop-fade haircut and baby-face looks, Murilo Duarte doesn't look like a typical financial adviser as he dishes out investment tips on social media from the Sao Paulo favela where he grew up.
Duarte, 28, who has more than a million followers on social media, is one of the "finfluencers"—financial influencers—who have gone viral in Brazil, bringing financial education to the masses in a country known for its gaping inequalities.
"You don't have to have a lot of money to be an investor, but you have to get your accounts organized first," says one video by Duarte, better known as "Favelado Investidor," or Investor from the Favelas.
"The idea is to democratize access to financial education and the world of investing, especially for the lower classes forgotten by society," Duarte told AFP.
Smart and charismatic, Duarte grew up in Jardim Joao XXIII, a poor neighborhood on the west side of Sao Paulo, Brazil's economic capital.