São Paulo airport mystery: two pallets of RTX 5090 GPUs worth about $470,000 vanish

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Brazilian electronics distributor Oderço Distribuidora (38 years in business, about 18 importing hardware) says two pallets of Zotac GeForce RTX 5090 graphics cards went missing after arriving at São Paulo/Guarulhos International Airport. Company president Oderço Matos put the acquisition cost at about R$2.5 million (~$470,000), with retail value significantly higher.

The company says it asked airport and freight authorities for an explanation, got no official response, and went public with an Instagram appeal around October 16. Based on the local retail price of about R$33,999.99 per card, the shipment represents at least 63 cards at wholesale cost.

The strange part: the pallets are large and heavy — too heavy to move without specialized equipment — yet no security-camera footage documents their movement. Airport officials are reportedly unwilling to cooperate with the press or the distributor; Brazil's Federal Police and Federal Revenue Service have issued no statements, and no arrests have been made. Reports stress this remains the distributor's claim — theft, misrouting and administrative error all remain possible until the airport, carrier or authorities publish findings.

The incident comes amid tight global RTX 5090 supply: Nvidia denied rumors it halted production on October 19, but secondary-market prices routinely run $5,000 to $9,500 per card, making flagship GPUs prime targets — following earlier cases such as hijacked AI-hardware shipments in California and Nvidia-branded trailers found to contain sand instead of cargo.