• By Leonardo Coelho
• November 4, 2026

Daniel Vorcaro, the jailed former CEO of the collapsed Banco Master, regularly sought to shape coverage at news outlets that he sponsored, pitching favorable stories and suggesting edits to drafts before they were published, according to Brazilian media’s reports on the banker’s text messages, which were leaked to the press last month.

News outlet UOL was the first to report on the messages, which appear to have been taken from Vorcaro’s devices after the Federal Police arrested him in March. Neither UOL nor other Brazilian news outlets reporting on the messages have explained how they obtained the messages. LatAm Journalism Review (LJR) was unable to independently verify the authenticity of the leaks. Vorcaro’s defense team has filed a petition with Brazil’s Supreme Federal Court questioning the integrity of the evidence extracted from the businessman’s cell phone, claiming data was modified after being in police custody.

According to the reporting on the leaked messages, Vorcaro regularly communicated with media executives or people connected to outlets like Grupo Globo, Metrópoles, Folha de S. Paulo, Brazil Journal and PlatôBR. Amid the fallout, Grupo Globo fired its CEO Frederic Kachar, citing his dealings with Vorcaro, and PlatôBR’s owner and partner of Brazil Journal, Flávio Carneiro, resigned from his position at the latter after the leaks showed he shared unpublished content with Vorcaro and promised revisions to stories. Other outlets named in the messages have denied wrongdoing, but did not deny being in touch with the banker.

The leaks not only gave insight into the banker’s deep web of influence across the Brazilian media landscape, but entangled the news industry, with outlets publishing stories that accuse competitors of dealing with Vorcaro while failing to disclose their own communications with the banker and denying accusations of wrongdoing at their own newsrooms. 

Marcia Benetti, a journalism professor at the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS) said the revelations about Vorcaro’s influence over Brazilian media raise serious concerns about the potential influence that sponsors have over news outlets and called on news outlets to reexamine how they silo their editorial decisions from their business operations.

Benetti added that the leaked messages show that, “when it comes to someone powerful, journalism relinquishes its independence without much moral conflict.”  

“The credibility of journalism is on a downward trajectory for many reasons, and when something like this comes to light, it serves as proof for many people that they cannot trust it,” she said. 

Media executives step down

The leaked messages show Globo’s Kachar communicated with Vorcaro between 2023 and 2025. Kachar oversaw newspapers like O Globo, Extra and Valor Econômico; magazines like Vogue and Marie Claire; and the company 's radio broadcasting network. 

During that time, the banker pitched stories and gave feedback to Kachar on articles written by O Globo journalists. The pair also negotiated sponsorship deals in the messages. 

In February 2025, Kachar presented Vorcaro with sponsorship proposals for the high-profile annual gala Vogue Ball, which takes place around Brazil’s carnival season, and the media group’s carnival VIP box. According to the messages, Banco Master contributed about 5.7 million reais (about US$1 million) to Grupo Globo as part of those deals. 

In October 2024, Vorcaro asked Kachar to give the banker’s then-girlfriend Martha Graeff —  who was launching a woman’s health company —  a cover spot on Vogue. Kachar did not agree, but days later the websites of three Globo magazines, Vogue Brasil, Marie Claire, and Ela featured Graeff and her products. 

Kachar sent the links to Vorcaro and asked him, “Let me know if anything is missing,” the leaked messages show. He later said the next step would be a cover in Ela or Marie Claire. “We just need a new angle,” he said. 

The messages also show that Kachar offered to make corrections on a story by G1, Grupo Globo news portal, about the sale of a supermarket chain to an asset management firm controlled by Banco Master. Other news outlets made similar corrections as well.

Vorcaro also complained to Kachar about the newspaper’s columnists, including Lauro Jardim and Malu Gaspar. The criticisms revolved around their coverage of Master’s dealings and Vorcaro’s web of influence. 

The exchange happened months after, according to authorities, Vorcaro attempted to plot a staged robbery on Jardim. Vorcaro and his allies had also conducted a background investigation on Gaspar in a failed effort to find personal information they could use to intimidate her. 

LJR reached out to Kachar for comment, but he did not respond. In a statement about Kachar’s firing, Grupo Globo’s press team described the former CEO’s relationship with Vorcaro as "inappropriate" and said that “the absolute editorial independence of the journalism in its media outlets” was essential to its operations. 

“The prominent role of the critical, impartial and independent coverage of the Master case is concrete evidence of the non-negotiable commitment of [Grupo Globo’s] media outlets to Grupo Globo’s editorial principles,” the statement said. 

Vorcaro also sought to influence the political and financial coverage of news outlets Brazil Journal and PlatôBR, according to Estadão newspaper. 

The leaks show that Flávio Carneiro, the owner of PlatôBR, now former partner at Brazil Journal and a friend of Vorcaro’s, shared with the banker an unpublished interview with the president of a bank that was trying to buy Banco Master. Vorcaro asked for revisions, which Carneiro promised to make. It is unclear whether PlatôBR made the changes Carneiro promised.  

In other messages, Vorcaro asked Carneiro to direct PlatôBR to target people that Vorcaro considered his enemies.

In an editorial published on Oct. 21, PlatôBR’s former editor-in-chief Rodrigo Rangel, wrote that Vorcaro had not interfered in any of the stories he had edited, stating that “the clearest evidence of this is that, from the launch of PlatôBR to today, there is not a single article among the content published by the journalists on my team that favors the former banker or his cronies, nor attacks his enemies.” 

Carneiro stepped down from Brazil Journal shortly after reporting on the leaks emerged. He still owns PlatôBR. Days later, Rangel quit as PlatôBR’s editor-in-chief, citing the leak’s revelations about Carneiro’s communications with Vorcaro, which included a promise to have Rangel change the stories Vorcaro had complained about.  

“The now-public messages from businessman Flávio Carneiro, the site's owner, reveal a side of his operations that I was unaware of, and the improper use of my name, in complete disagreement with my beliefs, my values regarding journalism, and the procedures I consider correct in the practice of the profession,” Rangel told Estadão.

Outlet versus outlet

The messages show Vorcaro was also in contact with journalist and Metrópoles CEO Lilian Tahan. The bank and the media group had soccer sponsorship and advertising contracts totalling 27 million reais (about US$5.3 million) between 2024-25.

According to UOL’s reporting on the messages, Tahan shared at least 14 stories with Vorcaro, 11 were altered after the banker asked for changes and at least two were published at his request. 

In an interview with LJR, Tahan confirmed she exchanged messages with Vorcaro for more than a year but pushed back against UOL’s framing. She said Vorcaro did not have full access to the 14 unpublished drafts mentioned by UOL, but confirmed it happened twice. 

“This occurred in two cases: one was a profile for which he gave a long interview to the reporter, and the text contains a lot of personal information, hence the need to check the data with him,” she said. “In the other situation, he was the primary source of the content. It is more than normal to ask him whether the information was accurate.”

Tahan said Metrópoles has published 3,254 articles about the Master case and that Vorcaro was only quoted as a source in 11 of them. Tahan added that the changes made to the stories reported by UOL were “absolutely minor and targeted, and they did not change the scope of the texts in question.” She also said no stories were published at Vorcaro’s request and that the two stories mentioned in UOL’s reporting were published not because he asked for it but because information he had shared gave rise to them.

The CEO said she considered her exchanges with Vorcaro were appropriate within her position as a media executive and a journalist. She said she treated Vorcaro like any other source or business partner and that any information she shared with him before publication was in the interest of verifying its accuracy.  

“Only those who are not involved in journalism on a daily basis fail to understand this. This is a practice we follow with public, business and legal authorities,” she told LJR. 

Tahan said her conversations with Vorcaro were leaked and misinterpreted by competitors “in a way that I considered inappropriate and ill-intentioned."

Metrópoles has done its own reporting on Vorcaro’s ties to legacy media groups in Brazil, though the outlet has not made any public disclosure about Tahan’s communications with the former banker. 

Metrópoles reported that Folha de S. Paulo — a newspaper that is part of Grupo Folha, which also publishes UOL — deleted excerpts of an investigation that had already been published online about an investment group partnered with Banco Master. 

Folha did not disclose the changes on the current version of the story. According to Metrópoles, Folha said the graphs were removed for clarity and because additional reporting was needed, not because anyone had requested it. 

Another Metrópoles story reported that Vorcaro paid $1 million reais (about US$ 196,000) to a PR agent to help postpone and soften a profile on him. According to Metropóles, the story was published 22 days later than intended and the PR agent told Vorcaro that it was in a “much milder form.” 

LJR asked Folha de S.Paulo about the stories Metrópoles published. A newspaper spokesperson told LJR the publication will not give statements regarding the issue. “We published what was to be published. Everything is explained in detail in the articles,” the spokesperson said. According to Metrópoles, Folha said the story was held because it was not ready and because Vorcaro had asked for time to make a statement, which the newspaper granted.  

A few days after Metrópoles’ story about Folha, the newspaper accused Metrópoles of publishing a false report in retaliation for UOL’s story on Tahan’s communications with Vorcaro. Alexandra Moraes, Folha's ombudsman discussed the issue in her Oct. 17 column, saying that she had talked with the PR agent Vorcaro had hired. He told Moraes that Folha never agreed to hold the story and that Metrópoles had distorted what happened. 

Vorcaro has been at the forefront of one of the biggest financial scandals in Brazilian history, with wide-ranging impacts in the country’s economy, politics, and media. 

Vorcaro’s rise began in 2018 when he bought a small bank and quickly made a fortune with it. The house of cards began to fall when Brazil’s Central Bank determined Banco Master could not uphold its obligations. Vorcaro was first arrested on fraud charges in November 2025 as part of a federal law enforcement crackdown targeting Banco Master. 

The businessman was released on bail eleven days later, but he was arrested once again in early March when Federal Police accused Vorcaro of conspiring with other people to monitor and threaten people he considered his enemies, including financiers, former employees and journalists. Jardim, one of Brazil’s most high-profile columnists, was among the targets.