About
Carol Paiffer is a Brazilian entrepreneur, investor, and educator whose stated mission is to “simplify money so anyone can use it as a tool for freedom.” Born on November 30 1987 in Porto Feliz, São Paulo, she co‑founded Atom S/A—the first proprietary‑trading company to list shares on B3, Brazil’s main stock exchange—and has been its CEO since 2013. A natural storyteller, she turned Atom’s YouTube channel and training platform into a community of tens of thousands of aspiring traders, winning fans far beyond Brazil’s financial circles.
Today her résumé blends boardrooms and TV studios: she leads Atom’s expansion across Latin America, mentors founders through Dinastia Hub, and fronts financial‑literacy campaigns that reach high‑school classrooms and remote farming towns alike. National fame arrived in 2020 when the Sony Channel invited her to the panel of Shark Tank Brasil. By mid‑2025, after four consecutive seasons in the tank, Carol had invested in more than eighty startups, ranging from beach‑tennis gear to eco‑friendly packaging solutions.
Before Fame
Raised in an entrepreneurial household, Carol learned early that money follows value. Her mother owned a children’s clothing boutique, filling the house with fabrics and sketches, while her father cultivated produce on the family plot and taught the kids how to price what they harvested. Their encouragement turned chores into micro‑ventures: at eight she sold lettuce to neighbors, and at ten she designed prints for local seamstresses.
At seventeen she moved to Campinas intending to study fashion, but a lunchtime chat with her older brother Joaquim—already fascinated by stock charts—reshaped her path. Curious, she sat beside him during trading sessions and realised the market rewarded discipline over pedigree. She switched to business administration and threw herself into day‑trading with a starting pot of just R$ 13 000, pooled from savings and a small loan from their dad.
Success was quick but not effortless. The siblings rose at dawn to review U.S. futures, logged every trade, and spent nights giving free lectures in exchange for sandwiches and the chance to recruit clients. Those talks became Paiffer Investimentos in 2006; within two years the desk managed six‑hundred accounts and beat the Ibovespa during the 2008 crisis. In 2013, spotting an inactive telecom shell, they executed a reverse takeover, renamed it Atom S/A, and pivoted to a model that funds qualified traders.
Trivia
- First million early: Carol crossed the one‑million‑reais mark at age twenty after pocketing R$ 3 500 in a single day with Lojas Renner stock—more than she would have earned in a month at a coveted Unilever internship she declined.
- Teacher at heart: Over 50 000 traders have completed Atom’s courses; graduates who pass risk controls can trade with company funds and keep up to 80 % of the profits.
- Sport supporter: In 2022 she funded Vasco da Gama’s women’s football program and has since backed HandDry, Total Beach Tennis, and other sports‑tech startups that blend athleticism and entrepreneurship.
- Still loves fashion: Her latest off‑screen project is a stake in Salão Casa Moda, the largest fashion B2B event in Latin America—an echo of her mother’s boutique roots.
- Nickname: Fans affectionately call her “Tubarona” (big female shark) for her tough negotiating style paired with an infectious laugh.
Family Life
Family remains Carol’s anchor. Brother Joaquim Paiffer chairs Atom’s board and co‑runs Dinastia Hub. Their parents—whose names she keeps private—appear often in her Instagram reels, dispensing farming wisdom and shop‑floor resilience to her audience. The siblings credit their father for the first trading bankroll and their mother for nurturing an eye for design that later informed Carol’s fashion investments.
When business allows, she retreats to the family farm near Porto Feliz, where weekends mix barbecue, strategy calls with founders, and horseback rides—a routine she says “recharges the mental battery.” Carol has never discussed marriage publicly; in podcasts she quips that her companies are “already a handful of kids” and that any partner would need to share her enthusiasm for spreadsheets and rural sunsets.
Associated With
On Shark Tank Brasil Carol shares the tank with veteran sharks João Appolinário (Polishop), Camila Farani (G2 Capital), Caito Maia (Chilli Beans), and José Carlos Semenzato (SMZTO). The group often joins forces on offers, especially when a founder fits Camila’s consumer‑brand eye and Carol’s financial discipline.
Beyond television she has co‑invested with Olympic swimmer‑turned‑coach Joel Jota and actor‑entrepreneur Felipe Titto; both partnerships sprang from pitches requiring a mix of capital and storytelling. Conference stages also keep her busy: in April 2025 she spoke at Web Summit Rio, urging founders to pair bold visions with sustainable unit economics—a mantra that mirrors her own leap from lettuce sales to multimillion‑real deals. Her journey shows that curiosity, grit, and a calculator can change a life.
