Amendments to Brazil betting MP would ban online casinos and threaten R$5bn in sponsorships

Amendments to Brazil's betting provisional measure under consideration in the National Congress would keep fixed-odds sports betting in the country but ban online casino games. The amendments are being examined in Congress, and the source does not state a date for a decision on them.

Casino games account for an average of 70% to 80% of betting companies' revenue, according to a source heard by the report. Larger companies can rely less on online casino and diversify revenue with sports betting, but that is not the predominant profile of the sector, the report said. Sports betting requires match-monitoring services such as those provided by Sportradar, a partner of Fifa and the CBF, while online casino games run on automatic programming with near-constant margins and no relevant exposure to losses, according to the report.

Fernando Marinho Mezzadri, general coordinator of the Instituto de Pesquisa Inteligência Esportiva (IPE) and a full professor at the Universidade Federal do Paraná (UFPR), said the financial impact of a scenario restricted to sports betting cannot be calculated exactly, citing the absence of reliable public data on companies' revenue. He said a return of operations would show the need to discuss the National Sports Fund so that the figures can be precise and more predictable.

According to a survey by IPE/UFPR, 16 clubs raised R$5bn in sponsorships from betting houses in 2025. In the same period, betting companies raised about R$30bn, according to an estimate. Mezzadri said the debate on sponsorships cannot set aside the public-health perspective, and said there had been an increase in appointments in the Sistema Único de Saúde (SUS) for treatment of gambling-related addiction. He said the problem of football clubs is and always has been a matter of management, not of banning betting, and that the fact companies inflated sports sponsorships indicates they operated with a large profit margin over losses generated in the population. He added that lottery revenue, an official and well-regulated channel, continues to grow.

The Associação Nacional de Jogos e Loterias (ANJL) does not work with an official figure for the share of each modality in operators' revenue. In a note to Estadão, the association said the betting market is very diversified and the size of operations varies case by case, and that the weight of online casino games in companies' financial results cannot be generalised. The ANJL also questioned the link between operator size and revenue profile, saying a large operator with global operations may concentrate most of its gains in games while smaller companies may have a more significant share from sports betting.

The ANJL said the central point concerns the regulatory structure. When Brazil regulated betting in 2023, each company paid a R$30m licence fee valid for five years, and the different modalities were considered in the revenue projection. The association said that if the structure changes, a review of the entire structure of operations in Brazil and of investments already made will be necessary. It also raised concern about illegal sites operating after a ban takes effect, an argument also used by clubs and companies in the campaign against the veto on betting.

Estadão asked the Secretaria de Prêmios e Apostas of the Ministry of Finance about the return of licences after publication of the provisional measure and about the number of company registration numbers closed in the sector. The secretariat replied only that the rule establishes that authorisations granted to companies in the sector will be extinguished 30 days after publication of the measure. The provisional measure was signed on Tuesday 25 September. From that date, the National Congress has 120 days to decide whether to convert it into federal law.