About 34,000 illegal betting sites are still operating in Brazil, the National Association of Games and Lotteries (ANJL) said on Tuesday 3 November, as the Supreme Federal Court (STF) held a public hearing on the future of the betting sector. The hearing was chaired by Justice Luiz Fux, the rapporteur of the case.

The ANJL said it identified the sites that morning using the LegitBet monitoring platform. Before the ban, Brazil had just 188 authorised betting sites, run by 85 companies licensed by the Ministry of Finance. Brazil banned fixed-odds betting and online casino through Provisional Measure (MP) 1.394/2026, published on 25 September.

The industry’s case

  • Pietro Cardia, a legal adviser to the ANJL, said earlier attempts at prohibition, which lasted more than 20 years, did not work, and that studies point to stricter regulation rather than a ban as the best way to limit harms such as compulsive gambling.
  • Cardia said betting volumes had already fallen 32% year on year in the latest three months of Ministry of Finance data, and that more than 60% of activity was in the regulated market before the ban, against 40% in the illegal one.
  • Bernardo Freire, also a legal adviser to the ANJL, said demand has moved to the illegal market rather than disappeared, and that within 30 days it was easy to show how simple it is to reach an illegal site.
  • The ANJL said the illegal market offers no guarantee that prizes will be paid, exposes children to gambling, carries money-laundering risk and pays none of the taxes that funded health, education and sport.

Spending and sport

Economist Eric Universo Rodrigues Brasil, speaking for the Brazilian Association of Economic Freedom (Able), said households spent R$37bn on bets in 2025, less than 0.5% of total household consumption of about R$8trn. He compared it with R$696.8bn in interest payments, R$152.1bn on mobile phones and accessories and R$69.7bn on streaming, and questioned the supermarket association ABRAS’s claim that the ban lifted food sales.

  • Igor Mauler Santiago, a lawyer for the Brazilian Football Confederation (CBF), said the CBF alone will lose R$420m in revenue in 2027. He said 27 of the 40 men’s Serie A and Serie B clubs have betting companies as main shirt sponsors, worth about R$1bn combined.
  • Pedro Henrique Rebello de Mendonca, for the Brazilian Olympic Committee (COB), said sports planning needs steady investment that supports athletes beyond the Los Angeles 2028 Games.
  • Mizael Conrado, President of the Brazilian Paralympic Committee (CPB), said regulation is the way to limit gambling harm and argued the MP does not meet the requirements for a provisional measure.
  • Lawyer Joao Paulo Bachur said the National Distribution Office (ENDR), which included about half of the licensed operators, passed R$580m to sports and civil society bodies between June 2025 and the MP’s publication in September.

The MP took effect immediately but needs approval from Congress to become permanent.