Brazil spends 6.4% of IT budget on security — 36% below the international standard. What that means for retail's budget decisions

A survey released by Brasscom in October shows Brazilian companies spend, on average, 6.4% of their IT budget on cybersecurity — a figure 36% below the 8%-to-12% range considered the international standard. The same study projects total cybersecurity investment in the country growing 49% by 2029, rising from roughly R$25.6 billion to R$38.2 billion a year.

A national aggregate number stays abstract until it turns into a concrete decision. In practice, 6.4% is the average of thousands of budget decisions made individually, company by company, year after year — including retail chains that, given their high transaction volume and direct consumer exposure, feel that gap faster than a sector with a more contained risk profile.

A national average is a symptom of a repeated individual decision

The investment gap isn't an outside force beyond any one company's control — it's the direct result of budget decisions made cycle after cycle, often driven by contract-renewal inertia rather than a real risk assessment. Every company that treats security as a fixed percentage of the IT budget, without recalculating against actual exposure, contributes to this below-standard national average.

Retail's volume amplifies the cost of the gap

Retail operations handle transaction volume and seasonal traffic spikes that multiply the impact of any protection gap — fraud that goes unnoticed repeats at a much larger scale when daily transaction volume is already high by nature. A gap that, in a lower-volume sector, would take longer to produce meaningful damage shows up faster in retail.

A 49% market-wide growth isn't automatic relief

The same report that flags the gap also projects strong growth in the country's cybersecurity market — but that aggregate growth doesn't automatically close any specific company's gap. A retail chain that assumes "the market as a whole is investing more" as a sign that its own risk is being addressed is confusing a sector-wide trend with an individual decision that still needs to be made internally.

The national gap only closes one decision at a time

Narrowing the gap between what your operation invests and what real risk demands doesn't depend on the market growing — it depends on reviewing, with concrete data, whether the current budget reflects real exposure or just renewal inertia. UNIQ helps retail chains run that math. Talk to the technical team to review where your operation stands against that gap.