According to the Superior Court of Justice (STJ), a monetary loan (mútuo) without a maturity date comes due thirty days after signing — and the five-year statute of limitations runs from then, even if no one has demanded payment.
What happened
In special appeal to the Superior Court of Justice (recurso especial, REsp) 2.241.623, decided unanimously by the Third Panel of the STJ, with Justice Nancy Andrighi as reporting justice, and reported on August 4, 2026, the court applied Art. 592, II, of the Civil Code: where no term has been expressly agreed, the term of the loan "shall be at least thirty days, if it is a monetary loan."
The consequence is straightforward. The statute of limitations begins on the day the claim accrues — and the claim accrues when the debt becomes due, that is, on the thirty-first day. A debt for a determinate amount recorded in a private instrument is subject to the five-year period under Art. 206, § 5, I, of the Civil Code. Agreement dated June 26, 2017, due on July 26, 2017, limitations period expired in July 2022. The August 2024 enforcement action came two years too late.
The technical reading
The instinctive reading of an agreement without a maturity date is a debt that "stays open until someone demands payment." The Civil Code says the opposite: the parties' silence does not create an obligation without a term; it creates an obligation with a statutory term of thirty days. The clock starts running on its own, without notice, without a formal demand, and without the creditor having to do anything — which means it also runs against the creditor who, out of delicacy, decided not to demand payment.
The real impact of this ruling is not on banking agreements, which always have a maturity date. It is in three areas where informality is the rule.
The first is the family. The father who lent his child money for an apartment down payment and formalized it in a two-page instrument, without a maturity date, because "between us, there is no need." Five years and one month later, that document ceased to be enforceable. And here there is a succession consequence that often goes unnoticed: if the amount was a loan and the claim became time-barred, it does not return to the estate as a receivable and is not addressed in the division of the estate; if it was an advance on the forced share of inheritance (adiantamento de legítima), it is subject to collation (colação, accounting for lifetime gifts in dividing the estate), under entirely different rules. The characterization of the document — loan or gift — determines who receives what in probate. A document without a maturity date and without clear characterization is the worst combination.
The second is the shareholder current account. Funds a shareholder provides to the company and entries the company makes for the shareholder, accounted for as loans, almost never have an instrument specifying a maturity date. In a corporate dispute, a valuation of a departing shareholder's interest, or a judicial reorganization, the liability presumed to be enforceable may not be — and the asset presumed to be recoverable may have legally evaporated years ago, without any accounting entry recording the fact.
The third is informal commercial credit: the supplier who finances a longstanding customer, the business owner who helps a partner, the transaction documented by email and a receipt. These are real claims, with real backing, that die because of a date.
There is a way out, and it precedes litigation. An unequivocal acknowledgment of the debt by the debtor interrupts the statute of limitations (Art. 202, VI, of the Civil Code) and restarts the period. A signed acknowledgment of debt, with a maturity date, installment terms, and, where possible, security, converts a claim on the verge of expiration into a new instrument. But this must happen within the five years — afterward, no acknowledgment can revive a time-barred claim, except through an express and valid waiver by the debtor, which is a different legal mechanism and depends on the debtor's willingness.
Who this reaches
- Parents and grandparents who lent to children and grandchildren under simple agreements without a maturity date
- Shareholders with current-account balances owed by the company, and companies with balances owed by shareholders
- Family holding companies that record loans between the holding company and family members
- Business owners and merchants who finance customers and partners without a formal instrument
- Estate administrators and heirs facing amounts advanced during life without documentary characterization
- Court-appointed administrators and creditors in judicial reorganization and bankruptcy
What to do, and by when
- Identify all loans without an express maturity date — family, corporate, and commercial — and calculate, for each, the statutory maturity date (signing + 30 days) and the limitations expiration date (maturity + 5 years). The result is a list with deadlines, not a static inventory.
- Act immediately on claims still within the window, formalizing an acknowledgment of debt with a fixed maturity date, installment terms, and security. A document signed by the debtor is what interrupts the statute of limitations — informal collection efforts, messages, and oral demands do not interrupt it.
- Document the characterization of each intrafamily transfer: a loan with a repayment obligation or an advance on the forced share of inheritance subject to collation. These are distinct legal regimes, with distinct succession effects, and the absence of characterization is resolved against the party asserting it.
- Adjust contracting practices going forward: every loan must specify an express maturity date, repayment method, charges, and monetary adjustment index. The missing clause is the one that causes the problem five years later.
- Reconcile the review with the accounting records of the company and the holding company, so that a time-barred receivable does not continue to appear as a realizable asset and an unenforceable liability does not continue to support a decision to distribute profits.
The cost of doing nothing
A legitimate, documented, and undisputed claim can disappear because of a clause no one wrote.
Editorial record
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Pillar: 3 — Credit, security, and enforcement
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Related service (performed in Brazil): audit of loan agreements and shareholder current accounts, secured acknowledgment of debt, notice and formal protest for nonpayment, enforcement of an extrajudicial enforceable instrument, documentary characterization of advances on the forced share of inheritance
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Editorial tier: Silver
Sources: Migalhas — STJ: for a monetary loan without a maturity date, the statute of limitations begins after 30 days, August 4, 2026 (REsp 2.241.623) (in Portuguese) · Civil Code, Art. 592 (Planalto) (in Portuguese) · Civil Code, Art. 206, § 5, I, and Art. 202, VI (Planalto) (in Portuguese) · STJ — case lookup for REsp 2.241.623 (in Portuguese)
Verification record
This week's topics were checked against primary sources on August 10, 2026: the official texts on the Presidential Office (Planalto) website for Law 15,270/2025, Law 9,249/1995, the Civil Code, and the Code of Civil Procedure; Federal Revenue Service announcements of August 3 and 6, 2026; and specialized news coverage of the judicial decisions.
Three editorial transparency caveats, recorded for the sake of rigor:
- The case number of the Court of Justice of the Federal District (TJDFT) in the marital property regime change was not disclosed by the secondary sources consulted; the text was drafted without citing it, and efforts to locate the appellate decision continue.
- The exact date of the ruling on special appeal to the Superior Court of Justice (recurso especial, REsp) 2.241.623 at the Superior Court of Justice (STJ) was not disclosed; the sources record the news publication date (August 4, 2026).
- The STJ Case Law Bulletin No. 895, dated August 4, 2026, could not be consulted because automated access was blocked and may contain legal holdings from the week that have not yet been reported.
Scope note: the week brought no new state rule implementing Supplementary Law (LC) 227/2026, which is why the state inheritance and gift tax (ITCMD) and tax reform package was deliberately excluded from these topics — the Editorial section has already published four pieces on the subject between July 31 and August 6, 2026.
Nonbinding: the decisions discussed are panel decisions with persuasive authority. They are not a statement of settled case law (súmula), a repetitive-appeal ruling, or a binding holding.
About the firm
Andrade & Cintra Advogados is a boutique law firm dedicated to Civil, Corporate and Real Estate Law, with a focus on Family and Succession Law, concentrated on estate and succession planning, the structuring of family and asset-holding companies, corporate governance and the organization of wealth for succession purposes — always with business purpose, substance and legal compliance. International practice in cooperation with Sintra Legal & Partners.
About the author
Dr. J. Guilherme de Andrade Cintra — Founding Partner · OAB/SP nº 220.915. Editorial co-authorship assisted by artificial intelligence (Anthropic Claude) as editor, under the review and responsibility of the signing attorney.
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