Brazilian lawmaker and presidential candidate Flavio Bolsonaro negotiated $24 million in financing from jailed banker Daniel Vorcaro to bankroll a biographical film about his father, former President Jair Bolsonaro, according to a new report by The Intercept Brasil.
The investigative news outlet, which cited a trove of leaked WhatsApp messages, said that at least $10.6 million was transferred in six tranches between February and May 2025 to finance “Dark Horse,” a feature-length biopic of the elder Bolsonaro starring American actor Jim Caviezel and directed by Cyrus Nowrasteh.
According to the report, the deal called for 14 installments totaling roughly$23.9 million. Intermediaries included the senator’s brother Eduardo Bolsonaro, former Bolonaro administration official Rep. Mario Frias, media executive Thiago Miranda, and evangelical pastor Fabiano Zettel. Brazilian authorities have identified Zettel, who is also Vorcaro’s brother-in-law, as the banker’s principal financial operator.
The payments were routed from Entre Investimentos e Participações, a firm Brazilian authorities suspect Vorcaro secretly controlled, to the Havengate Development Fund LP, a Texas-registered entity whose legal agent is Paulo Calixto, a lawyer for Eduardo Bolsonaro.
Reached by an Intercept reporter outside of Brazil’s Supreme Court on Wednesday, Sen. Bolsonaro denied the report. “Where did you get that information? It’s a lie,” he said, before laughing and walking away, according to the outlet.
Vorcaro, the owner of Banco Master, was arrested November 17, 2025 while allegedly attempting to flee Brazil amid a fraud investigation that authorities say left a 47 billion-real ($9.4 billion) hole in the country’s deposit insurance fund, the FGC. The Central Bank liquidated his bank the following day. Among other allegations, Vorcaro is also accused of bribing Brazilian officials, attempting to intimidate a journalist, and illegally accessing FBI and Interpol databases.
One day before Vorcaro’s arrest, Sen. Bolsonaro messaged the banker on WhatsApp, addressing him as a brother and voicing his support, The Intercept said.
Flavio Bolsonaro has previously denied financial ties between his family and Vorcaro, telling CNN Brasil in March that linking the Banco Master case to the political right was a “false narrative,” according to the Intercept. A 3 million-real donation to his father’s 2022 presidential campaign by Zettel occurred “without any link, without any quid pro quo, without any personal contact,” Bolsonaro said at the time.
The disclosures rattled Brazilian markets and the real fell as much as 2.2 percent against the dollar on Wednesday, the worst performance among emerging market currencies, Bloomberg reported.
“Flavio is heading to the center of the Master case,” Eduardo Cohn, a portfolio manager at Heritage Capital Partners, told Bloomberg. “The market believes this will significantly hurt his chances of beating Lula.”