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I've heard of this example before, and this is speculative but I wonder if it's because the speaker is counter-intuitively also the object of the phrase.

The root "obrigad" sounds a lot like the English word "obligate". If this is more than just a coincidence, then a more direct translation is "I am obliged" rather than "thank you". Said this way it makes a lot of sense why the verb is determined by the speaker.

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Yes, this is exactly the reason. (I am a native speaker)

Can it be extended with a reference to the (self-)object? Like "me llamo" being "I call myself" in Spanish for "my name is".

In Spanish, "me llamo" carries no gender information.

The difference between the "obrigado" in Portuguese example and the "me llamo" in Spanish example is that "obrigado" is probably an adjective while "llamo" is a verb. An equivalent Spanish example would be "estoy obligado" ("I am obligated" with male speaker) and "estoy obligada" ("I am obligated" with female speaker).

As an aside, I don't think Spanish has a word that's quite like "obliged". Maybe "endeudado", but that's just "in debt" and is not particularly about favors.

We can say "muy agradecido" or agradecida in formal context. It's unusual, but works as an example

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