CHILE Trends and Developments Contributed by: Jaime Winter, Jorge Cabrera and Felipe Berríos, Winter Etcheberry
The New Economic Crimes Law and Its Effect on Fraud and Assets Tracing in 2025 With the introduction of Law No 21.595, the gen - eral landscape of economic crime in Chile has changed significantly, reshaping the approach to fraud as well as to economic offences more broadly. Definition and Penalties for Fraud In the specific case of fraud, perhaps the most immediate observation is that the statutory defi - nition of the offence has finally been brought in line with the doctrinal understanding long held by Chilean legal scholars – namely, that fraud ( estafa ) involves deception, which leads to an error, which in turn results in a disposal of assets and causes a loss. While the statutory provision had not explicitly mentioned any of these ele - ments, case law had long interpreted it in this manner. Thus, the most significant changes are likely to be found in the area of sentencing. The applicable penalty for fraud has always been determined by the value of the defrauded amount. At the higher end of the scale, if the value exceeded 400 Unidad Tributaria Mensual (Month - ly Tax Unit – UTM) (approximately USD28,000), the applicable penalty was the maximum term of presidio menor en su grado máximo (imprison - ment for three years and one day to five years). Given the high monetary values often involved today, this upper range was deemed too broad. Accordingly, a new upper sentencing thresh - old was added: where the defrauded amount exceeds 40,000 UTM (approximately USD2.8 million), the penalty increases from presidio menor en su grado máximo to presidio mayor en su grado mínimo (five years and one day to ten years). Additionally, a specific aggravating factor was introduced for cases involving considerable
harm: if any fraud-related offence causes dam - age exceeding 80,000 UTM (approximately USD5.6 million) or affects a large number of individuals (although the law does not specify what constitutes “large number” ), the court may impose the penalty one degree higher than that otherwise established by law. This means that the sentence for fraud could reach presidio mayor en su grado medio (ten years and one day to 15 years). In the case of disloyal manage - ment of publicly traded companies, the sentence could reach presidio mayor en su grado máximo (15 years and one day to 20 years), which is the highest non-life-long custodial sentence under Chilean law. The Real Possibility of Effective Imprisonment To fully appreciate the implications of this, other elements must be considered. First, Chilean law provides for alternative sentencing under Law No 18.216, which, in simple terms, allows individuals without prior convictions to serve sentences of up to five years under a form of parole or supervised release ( libertad vigilada ). In practice, this meant that most fraud offend - ers – especially first-time offenders involved in high-value cases – were eligible for non-custo - dial sentences. With the introduction of penalties exceeding five years, there is now a real risk that offenders will face actual imprisonment at the higher end of the sentencing scale. A further consideration is that Law No 21.595 introduces a parallel sentencing regime specifi - cally for economic crimes. To be classified as an economic crime, the offence must fall into one of the four categories defined by the law. In simple terms, these include offences that are always considered economic crimes (such as collusion or securities market offences), and others (such as fraud) that are only considered economic when committed in the course of duties for a
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