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INTEL
PIG BUTCHERING: now the #1 loss category in the US by estimated volume / HUSHPUPPI: the Instagram that became the evidence -- Case 001 open / BEC: one spoofed email, one wire, seven figures -- see the methodology / ROSS ULBRICHT: full pardon January 21 2025 after 11+ years -- Case 013 open / ALL FIGURES LABELED: estimate vs conviction vs market collapse -- see Methodology / UNODC 2023: $5.4B estimated annually from SE Asia pig-butchering compounds [UNVERIFIED] / PIG BUTCHERING: now the #1 loss category in the US by estimated volume / HUSHPUPPI: the Instagram that became the evidence -- Case 001 open / BEC: one spoofed email, one wire, seven figures -- see the methodology / ROSS ULBRICHT: full pardon January 21 2025 after 11+ years -- Case 013 open / ALL FIGURES LABELED: estimate vs conviction vs market collapse -- see Methodology / UNODC 2023: $5.4B estimated annually from SE Asia pig-butchering compounds [UNVERIFIED]
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COMPANY · COMPANY

Odebrecht S.A. (now Novonor)

🇧🇷 Salvador / São Paulo, Brazil · FOUNDED 1944
THE FIGURE
~$788M
Bribes Odebrecht admitted paying to officials in 12 countries (US plea, December 2016).
WHAT IT SAID IT WAS

Latin America's largest construction and engineering group, a Brazilian family conglomerate with petrochemicals arm Braskem.

WHAT IT REALLY WAS

A company with a dedicated bribery department — the Division of Structured Operations — that ran off-book accounts and paid ~$788M in bribes across 12 countries to win contracts.

THE STORY

Norberto Odebrecht founded the firm in Salvador in 1944 and his family built it into Latin America's biggest builder, from Rio's Olympic venues to Miami's airport. From about 2001 a Division of Structured Operations, with its own shadow accounting system, paid bribes to win public contracts across the continent. Brazil's Car Wash investigation arrested CEO Marcelo Odebrecht in June 2015; in December 2016 the company and Braskem pleaded guilty in the US, Brazil and Switzerland to at least $3.5 billion in penalties. Shut out of contracts, the group filed for bankruptcy protection in 2019 and became Novonor in 2020; Marcelo's conviction was annulled by a Supreme Court justice in 2024.

WHO RAN IT
Marcelo Odebrecht ▸
CEO 2008–2015 · open the case file
Emílio Odebrecht
chairman (father) — cooperation agreement 2016; not jailed
Hilberto Mascarenhas
head of the Division of Structured Operations — cooperating witness (2016)
WHO WAS HURT
taxpayers in Brazil, Peru, Mexico, Angola and nine other countries
HOW IT ENDED
Founded
1944
Based
Salvador / São Paulo, Brazil
Ended
2020-12
How
fined and continued — pleaded guilty 2016; filed for bankruptcy protection June 2019 (~$13B of debt); renamed Novonor December 2020

21 December 2016: Odebrecht and Braskem pleaded guilty in Brooklyn and agreed to at least $3.5B in penalties to the US, Brazil and Switzerland (Odebrecht's share ~$2.6B, mostly to Brazil), then the largest foreign-bribery resolution ever. Further settlements followed in Peru, Ecuador, Colombia and elsewhere. Judicial recovery filed in Brazil June 2019 and Chapter 15 in New York August 2019.

SOURCES
justice.gov/usao-edny/pr/odebrecht-and-braskem-plead-guilty-and-agree-en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Odebrecht
Facts as published in court records, regulator releases and the sources above. Anyone charged and not convicted is alleged only.
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