Trinidad de Ayala
Trinidad de Ayala y Roxas was a businesswoman who inherited Ayala y Compañia from her father Antonio de Ayala and Margarita Roxas de Ayala. She displayed acute business acumen by guiding the company into banking and real estate development, despite the turbulent times she lived in.
She was born in 1856. She married Jacobo Zobel y Zangroniz on February 5, 1875, upon his release from prison. Doña Trinidad was very supportive of her husband's liberal causes, which she inherited from her mother Doña Margarita Roxas de Ayala, the renowned businesswoman and philanthropist.
Together the couple traveled often--to the Philadelphia World's Fair in 1876 and to Spain and France. Doña Trinidad was very much interested in the arts and she cultivated singing. La Ilustración Filipina magazine reported on March 28, 1892 that she was invited to sing in Malacañang with other sopranos of the period.
In 1898 upon the death of her husband Don Jacobo and with her brother-in-law Don Pedro Pablo Roxas in Paris, Doña Trinidad divested properties, including her husband's tramcar and pharmaceutical businesses. Showing extreme astuteness, she redeployed capital into marketable securities in hotels and trade which later boomed after the Filipino-American War and World War I. She increased family holdings in BPI, bought into Hong Kong & Shanghai Bank, and invested in Honk Kong real estate.
Under her stewardship Banco Español-Filipino expanded into branch banking, opening an office in Iloilo. She funded the development of Manila's first community water system, the Carriedo waterworks and in 1898 she led Ayala y Compañia into real estate development.
Upon the death of her brother-in-law Pedro Pablo Roxas Paris in 1912, Doña Trinidad acquired the Roxas interests in Ayala y Compañia. And in 1914 Hacienda San Pedro de Macati was given to her grandchildren--the children of Don Enrique Zobel de Ayala: Jacobo, Alfonso and Mercedes.
She died at the age of 62 in 1918. Her sons Don Enrique and Fernando continued her good work.