In Debt from Money-Never-Spent: Financial Fraud and Scams in Brazil’s Digital Economy

Popularly known in Brazil as golpes financeiros or simply golpes, financial scams and fraud reached an unprecedented level during and after the Covid-19 pandemic. This article investigates struggles over debt derived from golpes in cases of digital credit-money that was intercepted from within a financial institution. Engaging with anthropological literature on fraud and illicit econo¬mies, the ethnography tracks the life of the debt and the victims’ attempts to contest the debt from credit they never spent. In examining intricate questions of complicity, such as when banks and credit companies uphold repayment of fraudulent debt and appeal court decisions favouring the victim, the article shows how these actions blur the boundaries between fraudsters and financial institutions, trapping people in a predatory credit economy.