Decision time for Brazil's top bankers
Once Jorge Paulo Lemann fixes a target in his sights, he is single-minded about hitting it.
He may not have been the most naturally gifted tennis player but through sheer hard work and determination he became a Brazilian champion and played at Wimbledon. Friends say he would arrive at a Rio de Janeiro tennis club at 6.00am every day to get in some practice before going to work.
It has been the same thing with banking. Lemann was involved with two finance companies that didn't work out before starting up Garantia in 1971. Early on, a stock-market crash wiped out a significant part of the capital just after the brokerage had shelled out a record $800,000 for a seat on the Rio exchange. Undeterred, Lemann and his partners carried on.
"He [Lemann] has incredible focus. He only focuses on what is really important and he doesn't get distracted by secondary issues," says Fred Packard, a Briton who first went to Brazil between school and university in 1967. He returned after leaving Cambridge and joined Garantia in 1972.
Others describe Lemann as an austere character.