TRANSCRIPT
"I demand send another 200. Good little piggy."
There are people who find pleasure giving strangers their money.
No, it's not transactional.
There are no sexual favours involved and most of the time these people will never meet.
It’s called financial domination, and the internet is filled with videos of people selling it as an easy way to make money.
"If you're looking for a quick way to make some money real fast, look no further, because I have the thing for you."
It almost sounds too good to be true, right?
This is a look inside the world of financial domination.
Minki lives on the Gold Coast, is studying psychology and over the last two years has been a financial dominatrix.
"I won't say the exact amount, but from findom alone, I do make five figures a month."
SBS news went with Minki to an ATM.
"One of my pay pigs wants to do a cardless cash transaction. So that is when they will send me some bank codes. I'll go to whatever bank ATM they're with and then put in the codes and pick up however much money that they are giving me."
At the ATM, she sends him a voice message to let him know she’s waiting for his details.
"Hurry up and be a good little pay piggy and send me the code so I can drain all of your money… ooo they just came through. I can't wait to spend your money while you're at work all day."
In the world of financial domination, the people who are willingly and consensually handing over their money are called the submissives.
Sometimes they're called pay pig and most of the time they’re men.
Minki has never met any of these men and some have been sending her money and gifts for years.
"Findom, or financial domination, is basically a power play kink where the man finds pleasure in handing over his finances to a woman."
Minki built an online following as an adult content creator.
Now men on the internet seek her to send her money and gifts.
Sometimes they even give her access to bank accounts.
And no, there are no sexual favours exchanged.
"The sexual part actually takes place after, they will go and have some fun with the memory of what we've done. What's more powerful than money? Nothing."
Sometimes the submissive likes to be bullied or degraded out of their money.
When Minki sends them messages, they usually sound something like this:
"I am just zooming in on the photo that you sent me. This is pathetic… You're so fat and disgusting. OMG. I’m really excited to take your money."
While most submissives are men, not all dominants are women.
Kyron works in the sex industry.
And on the side, he also dabbles in financial domination.
"Rent is due. It’s time to pay your taxes, you little pay piggies."
One regular submissive sends $20 to $50 every week.
For him, part of the fantasy is the idea of struggling for someone else.
"They're quite regular. They'd rather give me the money than go out with their friends, so they'll be like, I'd much rather serve you, sir. That's probably a pretty common theme amongst them - they're depriving themselves to better my life, which is a pretty cool perk of the job."
Kyron says the giving of money and gifts for very little in return is one that took some time to understand.
"I guess you get a little bit of imposter syndrome and thinking what value are you providing here? People are sending you money and not really wanting any service in return. It's more about, I guess the emotional side of things."
Kyron says it’s not the “get rich quick” side hustle that people on the internet are portraying it as.
And often people are reaching out to him, promising send him money just to get his attention.
"You do get a lot of time wasters in this field. I'd say 80-90 per cent are time wasters. You get people reaching out to you pretty much just wanting your attention, sort of pledging that they're going to send you all this money. And the reality is they don't."
SBS visits a findom support group.
It's run by a guy called Kurt and for 10 years, he was addicted to sending money to women online.
"For me, the transfer of money was always, it was like a sacrifice. It is like temporarily not existing. It's just to escape."
There were years where Kurt sent money every single day until eventually he was bankrupt and his relationship had broken down.
"It had gotten to the point where I had multiple loans, credit card debt, basically declared bankrupt. What I've spent over years, I would've been able to buy a freestanding house and two really good cars for that kind of money."
Kurt has now seen the evolution of findom over 15 years.
He says it's pretty obvious why it's become more popular.
"You get a very big chance that the primary motivation is money and not the interest in the kink. The commercial incentive has grown."
Some dominants have even targeted people in online support groups where they're looking for help with their addiction.
"It becomes interesting for Doms to pull someone's recovery into findom play and obstruct that recovery over time. The most worrying one for me is that addiction itself has become a fetish."
Dr Sarah Ashton is a psychologist and sex therapist who specialises in kink.
She says it makes sense why people have eroticised money.
"Money represents power on so many levels. Think about what it gives someone in their life, what freedoms, what responsibilities, and think about how much of our world is driven by money."
Over the past few years, she's seen more people than ever before who are coming in and talking about findom.
And she says for people with a money kink, it’s not about whether the person has money or not.
"It's about whatever emotional experience they have. Sometimes it can feel really cathartic, healing and arousing to be in a completely submissive position. One theory is that if a man feels that earning and providing money is really connected to masculinity, however, in his relationships, that's not something that he's able to express, then perhaps this is an avenue for feeling a sense of contribution."
Taylor is a financial dominatrix from the New South Wales Central Coast.
She says it can be hard to know when the men are leaning into the fantasy or whether they’re actually struggling.
"Short-term suffering or sacrifice is totally okay in my eyes. Long-term, not really. If it doesn't involve anybody else and you're just going to do said thing anyway, then yeah, I'll take your fucking money. What's the point? Only the next person's going to get it anyways and I may as well get my bid in too.
You can watch the full documentary on SBS The Feed’s YouTube channel, where they go Inside the world of financial domination.
