Ricardo Benjamín Salinas Pliego (born 19 October 1955) is a Mexican businessman, founder and chairman of
Grupo Salinas
Grupo Salinas is a corporate conglomerate formed in 2001 by several Mexican companies. The group consists of:
* TV Azteca - television and radio network
* Grupo Elektra - products include finance, home appliances, consumer electronics, furnitur ...
,
a corporate conglomerate with interests in telecommunications, media, financial services, and retail.
He is the third richest person in Mexico and the 172nd richest person in the world with an estimated net worth of US$13.6 billion in February 2021.
Career
Ricardo Salinas Pliego is a CPA graduate of the
Instituto Tecnológico y de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey
Instituto Tecnológico y de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey (ITESM) ( en, Monterrey Institute of Technology and Higher Education), also known as Tecnológico de Monterrey or just Tec, is a secular and coeducational private university based in ...
(ITESM). After earning an MBA at
Tulane University
Tulane University, officially the Tulane University of Louisiana, is a private university, private research university in New Orleans, Louisiana. Founded as the Medical College of Louisiana in 1834 by seven young medical doctors, it turned into ...
, he joined Elektra in 1981 as import manager. He learned the business moves when the company faced dire financial straits at the continuing devaluation of the eighties. Between 1981 and 1986, Salinas experimented with other businesses such as a restaurant in Monterrey, satellite dishes and the sale of systems multi communication.
In 1987 Ricardo succeeded his father
Hugo Salinas Price
Hugo Salinas Price (born March 11, 1932) is a Mexican business magnate, investor, and philanthropist. He is the founder of Mexico's Elektra retail chain.
He also owns the second largest gold mine and silver mines in the state of Durango.
Bi ...
as
CEO
A chief executive officer (CEO), also known as a central executive officer (CEO), chief administrator officer (CAO) or just chief executive (CE), is one of a number of corporate executives charged with the management of an organization especially ...
of
Grupo Elektra
Grupo Elektra is a Mexican financial and retailing corporation established by Hugo Salinas Price. The company has operations in Latin America and is the largest non-bank provider of cash advance services in the United States.
It is listed on th ...
. The company began as a family-owned furniture manufacturing company called Salinas & Rocha founded in 1906 by Salinas' great-grandfather, Benjamin Salinas. In 1950, Hugo Salinas Rocha created Grupo Elektra and when Ricardo Salinas became CEO of the company in 1987 he refocused Elektra on basic products: appliances, electronics, and furniture. Significantly, he developed at Elektra a vast new consumer market among
Mexico
Mexico (Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guatema ...
's lower middle income consumers by providing credit sales and diverse financial products and services.
Grupo Elektra expanded further and became Mexico's biggest consumer-finance company when, in 2002, it won the first banking license granted to any Mexican institution in nearly a decade. The strategy was to build new markets by creating new buying power among classes of people largely ignored by most other major Mexican businesses. Thus was born Banco Azteca, which currently has operations in Mexico,
Panama
Panama ( , ; es, link=no, Panamá ), officially the Republic of Panama ( es, República de Panamá), is a transcontinental country spanning the southern part of North America and the northern part of South America. It is bordered by Cos ...
,
Guatemala
Guatemala ( ; ), officially the Republic of Guatemala ( es, República de Guatemala, links=no), is a country in Central America. It is bordered to the north and west by Mexico; to the northeast by Belize and the Caribbean; to the east by H ...
and
Honduras
Honduras, officially the Republic of Honduras, is a country in Central America. The republic of Honduras is bordered to the west by Guatemala, to the southwest by El Salvador, to the southeast by Nicaragua, to the south by the Pacific Oce ...
. Subsequently, Grupo Elektra obtained two financial licenses from the federal government to create
Seguros Azteca and Afore Azteca.
Salinas is also chairman of
TV Azteca
TV Azteca, S.A.B. de C.V. is a Mexican multimedia conglomerate owned by Grupo Salinas. It is the second-largest mass media company in Mexico after Televisa. It primarily competes with Televisa as well as some local operators. It owns two national ...
, one of the world's two largest producers of Spanish-language television programming. Under his leadership, TV Azteca broke Mexico's long-standing television monopoly through the successful privatization of a media package offered by the government.
In 2001, TV Azteca launched
Azteca America
Azteca is the Spanish word for Aztec. In English, Azteca or Aztecas may refer to:
Animals
* ''Azteca'' (ant), a genus of ants
* Azteca horse, a breed of horse
Games
* Azteca, a world in the online game of ''Wizard101''
Sport
* Aztecas de la U ...
, a wholly owned Spanish-language broadcasting network aimed at the 50 million-strong Hispanic population of the United States. Azteca America had affiliates in 70 markets, including
Los Angeles
Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...
,
New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...
,
Chicago
(''City in a Garden''); I Will
, image_map =
, map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago
, coordinates =
, coordinates_footnotes =
, subdivision_type = Country
, subdivision_name ...
,
Miami
Miami ( ), officially the City of Miami, known as "the 305", "The Magic City", and "Gateway to the Americas", is a East Coast of the United States, coastal metropolis and the County seat, county seat of Miami-Dade County, Florida, Miami-Dade C ...
and
Houston
Houston (; ) is the most populous city in Texas, the most populous city in the Southern United States, the fourth-most populous city in the United States, and the sixth-most populous city in North America, with a population of 2,304,580 in ...
, reaching 89 percent of the Hispanic population in the U.S. Azteca America was sold to
HC2 Holdings
INNOVATE Corp. (formerly known as HC2 Holdings, Inc. and Primus Telecommunications Group, Inc.) is an American public financial services company founded in 1994.
History
Beginning (1994–1997)
Primus commenced operations in 1994 intent on bei ...
in 2017.
In 2003, Salinas bought Iusacell (the first cell phone company in Mexico) and four years later, merged it with
Unefon, another cell phone company, founded by him in 1999. However, in early 2015, Grupo Salinas announced the sale of Iusacell to
AT&T
AT&T Inc. is an American multinational telecommunications holding company headquartered at Whitacre Tower in Downtown Dallas, Texas. It is the world's largest telecommunications company by revenue and the third largest provider of mobile tel ...
Today, with Totalplay, offers the most innovative internet and television services and telephony via fiber optics to home. Also, Totalplay Empresarial provides broadband internet access video surveillance, broadband interfaces, videoconferencing, among other services to institutions and companies throughout Mexico.
In 2012, Grupo Elektra acquired Advance America, —currently Purpose Financial
—, a company that provides short-term non- bank loans in the United States. Also put into operation Punto Casa de Bolsa. The Group operates more than six thousand points of contact in Mexico,
United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...
, Guatemala, Honduras,
Peru
, image_flag = Flag of Peru.svg
, image_coat = Escudo nacional del Perú.svg
, other_symbol = Great Seal of the State
, other_symbol_type = Seal (emblem), National seal
, national_motto = "Fi ...
and Panama.
Salinas has participated and addressed The
World Economic Forum
The World Economic Forum (WEF) is an international non-governmental and lobbying organisation based in Cologny, canton of Geneva, Switzerland. It was founded on 24 January 1971 by German engineer and economist Klaus Schwab. The foundation, ...
, The Economist Roundtable on Mexico, the
Young Presidents' Organization
YPO (formerly Young Presidents' Organization) is an American-based worldwide leadership community of chief executives with approximately 29,000 members in more than 130 countries, according to the organization's 2019 YPO international fact sheet. ...
,
UCLA
The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California. UCLA's academic roots were established in 1881 as a teachers college then known as the southern branch of the California St ...
, the Institute of the Americas,
Harvard Business School
Harvard Business School (HBS) is the graduate business school of Harvard University, a private research university in Boston, Massachusetts. It is consistently ranked among the top business schools in the world and offers a large full-time MBA p ...
and
TED
TED may refer to:
Economics and finance
* TED spread between U.S. Treasuries and Eurodollar
Education
* ''Türk Eğitim Derneği'', the Turkish Education Association
** TED Ankara College Foundation Schools, Turkey
** Transvaal Education Depa ...
, where he discussed issues related to globalization, education, entrepreneurship, freedom and opportunity in the BOP. He also has a blog where he publishes his business, political, economic and cultural ideas. His articles have been published in ''
The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'', ''
The Boston Globe
''The Boston Globe'' is an American daily newspaper founded and based in Boston, Massachusetts. The newspaper has won a total of 27 Pulitzer Prizes, and has a total circulation of close to 300,000 print and digital subscribers. ''The Boston Glob ...
'', ''
The Hill'', ''
Newsweek
''Newsweek'' is an American weekly online news magazine co-owned 50 percent each by Dev Pragad, its president and CEO, and Johnathan Davis (businessman), Johnathan Davis, who has no operational role at ''Newsweek''. Founded as a weekly print m ...
'' in Spanish, ''La Opinión'', and regularly writes in the Mexican press. Mr. Salinas was the first Mexican to elect the Board of Trustees of the
Aspen Institute.
It was announced in 2020 that Salinas had 10% of his liquid portfolio invested in
Bitcoin
Bitcoin ( abbreviation: BTC; sign: ₿) is a decentralized digital currency that can be transferred on the peer-to-peer bitcoin network. Bitcoin transactions are verified by network nodes through cryptography and recorded in a public distr ...
.
Philanthropy
Salinas formed the nonprofit
Fundación Azteca in 1997 to address a broad range of social problems with ongoing campaigns in healthcare and nutrition, education, and the protection of the environment. It is a foundation that finances and supports other foundations. Fundación Azteca has raised millions of dollars, benefiting hundreds of thousands of lives.
In April 2021, the Ricardo B. Salinas Pliego Center was inaugurated,
a space that seeks to promote the development of ideas that contribute to the transformation of Mexico, based on six lines of action: Freedom, Rule of Law, Education, Leadership, Art and Culture, and Innovation and Entrepreneurship. The initiative is made up of the following programs: Arte & Cultura,
through which artistic and cultural activities are promoted to raise the quality of life of society; Caminos de la Libertad,
a space for reflection on different aspects of freedom that seeks to raise awareness of its value and Kybernus,
which promotes the formation of young leaders from the local level.
Controversies
Salinas has been involved in a series of political and financial scandals (which include investigations by the American
Securities and Exchange Commission
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is an independent agency of the United States federal government, created in the aftermath of the Wall Street Crash of 1929. The primary purpose of the SEC is to enforce the law against market ...
and the Mexican
Comisión Nacional Bancaria y de Valores
In Mexico, the Comisión Nacional Bancaria y de Valores (CNBV) ( en, National Banking and Securities Commission) is an independent agency of the Secretariat of Finance and Public Credit (Mexico) (SHCP) body with technical autonomy and executive p ...
), and has been linked to ex-President
Carlos Salinas de Gortari
Carlos Salinas de Gortari CYC DMN (; born 3 April 1948) is a Mexican economist and politician who served as 60th president of Mexico from 1988 to 1994. Affiliated with the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), earlier in his career he wor ...
. Salinas was charged by the American
Securities and Exchange Commission
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is an independent agency of the United States federal government, created in the aftermath of the Wall Street Crash of 1929. The primary purpose of the SEC is to enforce the law against market ...
in January 2005 with being engaged in an elaborate scheme to conceal Salinas's role in a series of transactions through which he personally profited by $109 million. The SEC complaint also alleged that Salinas and Padilla sold millions of dollars of TV Azteca stock while Salinas's self-dealing remained undisclosed to the market place. This was settled in September 2006 with Salinas required to pay $7.5M while not admitting guilt. As part of the settlement, Salinas was forbidden for five years to serve as officer or director of any United States publicly listed company.
Esteban Moctezuma
Esteban Moctezuma Barragán (born 21 October 1954 in Mexico City) is a Mexican politician formerly affiliated with the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) and is currently a member of MORENA. He is a former Senator and served as Secretary of ...
(ex-Secretary of Interior of
PRI President
Ernesto Zedillo
Ernesto Zedillo Ponce de León (; born 27 December 1951) is a Mexican economist and politician. He was 61st president of Mexico from 1 December 1994 to 30 November 2000, as the last of the uninterrupted 71-year line of Mexican presidents from t ...
), was appointed as
Chief Executive Officer
A chief executive officer (CEO), also known as a central executive officer (CEO), chief administrator officer (CAO) or just chief executive (CE), is one of a number of corporate executives charged with the management of an organization especially ...
of
Fundación Azteca in 2002 by Salinas Pliego. His daughter,
Ninfa, entered to the
PVEM
The Ecological Green Party of Mexico ( es, Partido Verde Ecologista de México, , PVEM or PVE) is a green-conservative political party in Mexico. In the 2012 legislative elections, the party took 34 seats in the Chamber of Deputies (out of 50 ...
party (linked to the PRI party, some old but now of recent political endeavor) in 2009.
Football game and presidential debate
Salinas decided to air the 2011–12 quarter final game between
Tigres de la UANL
Club de Fútbol Tigres de la Universidad Autónoma de Nuevo León, simply known as Tigres UANL or Tigres, is a Mexican professional football club based in San Nicolás de los Garza, a city in the Monterrey metropolitan area, Nuevo León. Foun ...
and
Monarcas Morelia, two professional football teams from the
Mexican Primera División
The Liga MX, officially known as the Liga BBVA MX for sponsorship reasons, is the top professional football division in Mexico, holding 2 tournaments per year.
The league is considered the strongest in North America, and among the strongest in al ...
, during the same time as the presidential debate of the
2012 Mexican general election
General elections were held in Mexico on Sunday, July 1, 2012. Voters went to the polls to elect a new president of Mexico, President of the Republic to serve a six-year term, replacing Felipe Calderón, 500 members of the Chamber of Deputies o ...
s. The day of these two events were set for 6 May 2012.
He posted on
Twitter
Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...
the following message on 30 April 2012:
Emilio Azcárraga Jean
Emilio Fernando Azcárraga Jean III (; born 21 February 1968) is a Mexican businessman who currently serves as the chairman of both mass media company Televisa and professional football team Club América.
In 1997, at the age of 29, Azcárr ...
, the CEO of
Televisa
Grupo Televisa is a Mexican multimedia mass media company. A major Latin American mass media corporation, it often presents itself as the largest producer of Spanish-language content.
In April 2021, Televisa and Univision Communications announce ...
, posted a message on Twitter to "clarify the doubts" by stating that it was not Televisa who was planning to air the game between Tigres and Morelia, but rather TV Azteca, the closest television competitor to his company.
The
Federal Electoral Institute
The Instituto Nacional Electoral (INE) (English for ''National Electoral Institute'') (formerly Federal Electoral Institute (, IFE)) is an autonomous, public agency responsible for organizing federal elections in Mexico, that is, those relate ...
(IFE) and its president,
Leonardo Valdés Zurita, asked for TV Azteca to not air the game at the same time as the presidential debate.
[ According to Zurita, the IFE has already set up the permissions and invitations to carry out the debate, but also recognized that other media companies can air programs they consider relevant.] In addition, the electoral councils in Mexico recognized that this incident will leave the Mexican people with two difficult dilemmas: "watch football or the presidential debate between Josefina Vázquez Mota
Josefina Eugenia Vázquez Mota ( o̞.se̞'fi.na'βas.ke̞s'mo̞.ta (born 20 January 1961, in Mexico City) is a businessperson and politician who was the presidential candidate of the National Action Party (PAN) for the 2012 elections. Vázque ...
(PAN), Enrique Peña Nieto
Enrique Peña Nieto (; born 20 July 1966), commonly referred to by his initials EPN, is a Mexican politician who served as the 64th president of Mexico from 1 December 2012 to 30 November 2018. A member of the Institutional Revolutionary Party ...
(PRI), Andrés Manuel López Obrador
Andrés Manuel López Obrador (; born 13 November 1953), also known by his initials AMLO, is a Mexican politician who has been serving as the 65th president of Mexico since 1 December 2018. He previously served as Head of Government of Mex ...
(PRD) and Gabriel Quadri de la Torre (PANAL)." Nonetheless, the majority of the messages posted on Twitter criticized Salinas Pliego for this incident.
Anonymous group and Grupo Salinas
Following the decision of Salinas, the internet group Anonymous "attacked" the official website of Grupo Salinas
Grupo Salinas is a corporate conglomerate formed in 2001 by several Mexican companies. The group consists of:
* TV Azteca - television and radio network
* Grupo Elektra - products include finance, home appliances, consumer electronics, furnitur ...
on 1 May 2012, posting on Twitter that they wanted the presidential debate and not the football game. The official webpage—www.gruposalinas.com—was not available for some time.
TV Azteca accepts to air debate
On 3 May 2012, the IFE acknowledged that TV Azteca
TV Azteca, S.A.B. de C.V. is a Mexican multimedia conglomerate owned by Grupo Salinas. It is the second-largest mass media company in Mexico after Televisa. It primarily competes with Televisa as well as some local operators. It owns two national ...
decided to air the presidential debate on XHTVM-TV
XHTVM-TDT (virtual channel 40) is a television station in Mexico City, owned by Televisora del Valle de México and operated by TV Azteca. It is branded as ''adn40'' and available over the air in much of Mexico on TV Azteca's transmitters. Progr ...
, commonly referred to as Proyecto 40. On his defense, Salinas said on 4 May 2012 that the "majority of the population is not interested in the presidential debate." He claimed that only 15% of the population is interested in the debate, while 54% of them claim they are not interested at all.[ If the statistics were different, he said, then he would have adjusted his strategy.][ Salinas then said that his business "understands well" the preferences of the population and takes decisions accordingly.][
]
Companies
* Grupo Salinas
Grupo Salinas is a corporate conglomerate formed in 2001 by several Mexican companies. The group consists of:
* TV Azteca - television and radio network
* Grupo Elektra - products include finance, home appliances, consumer electronics, furnitur ...
.
* Retail and Financial Services
** Grupo Elektra
Grupo Elektra is a Mexican financial and retailing corporation established by Hugo Salinas Price. The company has operations in Latin America and is the largest non-bank provider of cash advance services in the United States.
It is listed on th ...
.
*** Purpose Financial.
*** Punto Casa de Bolsa.
** Banco Azteca
Banco Azteca is a Mexican bank chain which operates in Mexico, Panama, Guatemala, Honduras, Peru and El Salvador. The company's products are consumer credit for goods, personal loans, small business loans, credit cards, mortgages and payroll syst ...
.
*** Seguros Azteca.
*** Afore Azteca.
** Tiendas Neto.
* Media
** TV Azteca
TV Azteca, S.A.B. de C.V. is a Mexican multimedia conglomerate owned by Grupo Salinas. It is the second-largest mass media company in Mexico after Televisa. It primarily competes with Televisa as well as some local operators. It owns two national ...
.
*** Azteca Guatemala.
*** Azteca Honduras.
* Telecommunications
** Totalplay.
** Totalplay Empresarial.
* Motorcycles
** Italika
Italika is a motorcycle brand and manufacturer in Mexico, with 400,000 motorcycles sold in 2014. In 2010, Italika made up 55% of the Mexican motorcycle market; in 2011 it reached a 63% market share, largely owing to low initial cost. Italika sold ...
.
* Other Companies
** Upax.
** Agencia i.
** Promo Espacio.
** Grupo Dragón.
** Totalsec.
* Social Value
** Fundación Azteca.
** Centro Ricardo B. Salinas Pliego.
** Kybernus.
** Arte y Cultura Grupo Salinas.
* Soccer
** Mazatlán F.C.
Mazatlán Futbol Club is a Mexican professional football team based in Mazatlán, Sinaloa currently playing in Liga MX. The club was established in June 2020 after the Monarcas Morelia franchise announced that it would be moving to the city of ...
See also
* List of Mexican billionaires
The following is a Forbes list of Mexican billionaires is based on an annual assessment of wealth and assets compiled and published by ''Forbes'' magazine on April 17, 2017, updated April 13, 2023.
Mexican Rich List 2023
# Carlos Slim - US$93.0 ...
* List of people named in the Panama Papers
This is a partial list of people named in the Panama Papers as shareholders, directors and beneficiaries of offshore companies. The International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) released the full list of companies and individuals ...
References
External links
Official website
Forbes: Salinas Pliego & Family
(in Spanish)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Salinas Pliego, Ricardo
1955 births
Mexican football chairmen and investors
Businesspeople from Mexico City
Mexican billionaires
Mexican company founders
Mexican mass media owners
Mexican people of American descent
Monterrey Institute of Technology and Higher Education alumni
Tulane University alumni
Freeman School of Business alumni
Living people
People named in the Panama Papers
Mexican television executives
TV Azteca people
People named in the Paradise Papers