The Prizes and Betting Secretariat (SPA) has set a deadline for betting companies seeking to operate in Brazil to obtain authorization.
Operators who have not requested authorisation to operate in the region will have operations suspended from 1 October, until they receive permission from the SPA.
With this, only those operators already in operation and who have requested authorization to explore the fixed-odds lottery betting modality prior to this date can continue to operate.
This means that, from October, operators that haven’t requested authorisation through the Ministry of Finance’s betting management system SIGAP will be classed as illegal until they obtain authorization from the Treasury.
This comes ahead of the regulated betting market in Brazil going live on 1 January 2025 and at which point only operators complying with the laws and ordinances will be able to operate.
Demand to operate in the region has been high, with Gaming America reporting towards the end of August that the country had received 114 applications for iGaming licences.
Secretary of Prizes and Bets of the MF Regis Dudena said: “We will maintain the adaptation period until the end of December only for those who have already demonstrated that they want to act in accordance with the law, in accordance with Brazilian rules. Many police operations involving companies that operate in the betting market in a criminal manner have come to light. This was the way we found to not wait until January to start separating the wheat from the chaff.
“We want to protect the mental, financial and physical health of bettors, preventing the activities of companies that use sports betting and online games as a means of committing fraud and money laundering.
“The adaptation period cannot be used to fail to comply with laws already in force, such as the Money Laundering Law (Law No. 9,613/1998), the Financial Crimes Law (Law No. 7,492/1986), the Consumer Protection Code, the Child and Adolescent Statute (ECA), among others. When analysing authorisation requests, we are taking into account the commission of illegal acts.”
In other news from South America, the Argentine Football Association (AFA) has announced the renewal and expansion of its partnership with SmartSoft.
