Manuel Antonio Matos

Matos held a great political and economic influence on the country, during the late 19th and early 20th centuries, having an extraordinary prestige and power in the banking and business fields.

[4][page needed] Major disagreements between president Cipriano Castro and the economic elite evolved into an open war that shook the country and brought the government to the brink of collapse, but after the revolution's defeat suffered in the Siege of La Victoria in November of 1902, the vast network of armies and its extraordinary power was weakened, being a wound that could not be recovered.

A few days after, in the midst of this civil war, Germany, the United Kingdom and later Italy instituted what came to be known as the naval blockade of Venezuela in order to force the government to honor its foreign debts.

The rest of the Revolutionary Army finally was defeated in the battle of Ciudad Bolivar, at which in March of 1903 Matos decides to leave Venezuela, establishing himself in Paris.

[1][page needed] After his departure from the presidential cabinet in 1913, Matos continued to dedicate himself to the formation of a solid banking and financial structure for Venezuela, retiring from public life in 1920 and settling in Paris, where he died nine years later.