[1] He went on to earn a bachelor's degree in finance, economics and business administration from the Pontifícia Universidade Católica de São Paulo.
In January 2008, he was appointed BAT's chief operating officer (COO), and in March 2011 became the company's first non-British CEO.
During his initial tenure as CEO, BAT's shares began to climb in value, and had doubled in price by 2016.
[1] However, in 2018 BAT's share price collapsed, returning to levels last seen in 2011;[2] it appeared that Durante had misjudged the FDA's attitude towards menthol cigarettes, and that BAT had overpaid in the acquisition of the Reynolds American tobacco company minority interest in July 2017.
At the time, this amounted to the largest foreign investment ever made in a US firm, costing $49 billion and "creating the world's biggest listed tobacco company".