About Roberto Neto
In a March 2024 podcast conversation with his successor Gabriel Galipolo, former Central Bank of Brazil president Roberto Campos Neto discussed his tenure and the transition of leadership. He stated that he would not accept reappointment and aimed for a smooth transition. Campos Neto noted that the Central Bank was criticized both for not cutting interest rates enough and for cutting them too much, and he remarked that the bank likely did the right thing. He also highlighted innovation, such as the PIX payment system, as a factor that put Brazil at a differentiated level internationally, and advised that it is important to maintain close relations with Congress because most Central Bank changes become legislative bills. Regarding cryptocurrencies, he said that decentralized finance is accelerating and forcing banks to approach the sector differently.
In a March 2026 interview, Campos Neto, now Vice-Chairman of Nubank and global head of public policy, analyzed the impact of a war in Iran on interest rates and investment in Brazil. He stated that the world is so indebted that governments have less room to implement countercyclical policies, and that governments face more problems with fewer degrees of freedom. He also noted that in the United States, the non-bank financial intermediation sector is large and that large credit managers are beginning to freeze redemptions.
Source: AI-verified profile updated from Roberto Neto's recent appearances.
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✨ AI-enhanced transcript with speaker attribution
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Interviewer0:00
Now, before we get into the discussion about central bank autonomy, I wanted to ask a more personal question. You are a father, you have two children, about 6 years old, in Brasília, family here, and you were coming and going. How was that time for your family as well?
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Roberto Neto0:14
Well, in retrospect, I think it was a mistake not to move the family to Brasília, you know? To have taken everyone there. I think the directors, specifically Bruno, who moved with his family, I think he had a better quality of life than I did, having to do the shuttle, the flights, going back and forth almost every week. But then it got to a point where I was almost at the end, and it wasn't worth making the move anymore. But in retrospect, I would have done it differently, because the shuttle, or the Brasília round trip, after 4 or 5 years, becomes tiring.
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Interviewer0:48
Roberto, you are Roberto Campos Neto. For our audience, who was Roberto Campos Neto, your grandfather. Your grandfather has a saying that he suffered many attacks and injustices at the time, when things weren't as polarized, we were in a Cold War era, but that time made his critics respect him. Did that inspire you a little?
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Roberto Neto1:12
Look, everything he did inspired me a bit. I think he had a vision that was very ahead of his time, and it's always difficult when you see too far ahead, because you are usually misunderstood. That's why he said that eventually time tells the story. He had a vision of micro-science, nanotechnology, technology, computing. At the time, there was even a dispute over the informatics law, and he had a view that Brazil needed to insert itself more into this world of technology. So he foresaw many things. That's something I admired a lot, that he had the ability to look ahead. And I think he was a politician who was not very political, you know? Because he came from a diplomatic career. We even joked that he was a diplomat who was not very diplomatic, because he had strong opinions. He would go to Congress and write articles with strong opinions too. But I learned a lot from him. It was a great school. I had the pleasure of spending many years with him at the end, and he used to give lectures. So, from time to time I went to the lectures with him, so it was a great learning experience for me.
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Interviewer2:16
Since you were young, you accompanied your grandfather, and in this way you were inspired by him.
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Roberto Neto2:20
Yes. He wanted us to become doctors, believe it or not. He wanted to be a doctor himself but couldn't because he didn't have the resources, so he ended up going to the seminary. So he had this wish that one of his grandchildren would be a doctor. And, let's say, to his distress, my younger brother, the one right after Rafael, started medical school but later dropped out. In the end, even my youngest brother is a doctor, you know? And he fulfilled my grandfather's wish, but much later. But he always wanted to be a doctor. He had this fascination with medicine, ended up not able to, entered the seminary, then became a diplomat, studied economics in Washington. So his career turned, he became an economist later on.
