Will Legalized Gambling Hurt or Help the Brazilian Economy

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So this seems like an old thread but now in 2024 -  does anyone understand what is going on with this discussion about "Bets" and them being prohibited?

I see it on the news everyday, even people getting arrested and also some influencers or even artists on social media advertising with links. Are these even related no idea.

Seeing the government discuss it pretty frequently I became curious though. What exactly is going on?

11/24/24 @rocade.  I only know what I read in the papers and online betting isn't a topic I've looked into in detail (not being a bettor), but here are the outlines as I understand them.

Brazil legalized fixed-odds sports betting in 2018, and quickly became the seventh biggest market for online betting in the world, US$4.9 Billion in 2024, bigger than Canada and approaching Italy.

This began causing concern at the Banco Central because of the size of the currency flows and their possibilities for hiding money laundering, and at the Federal Government pressure began to grow to ensure that the action was on the level.  Understandably, the Federal Government is also interested in taxing all that movement of money, and is  concerned about the competition for its own Loteria business through the Caixa Econômica Federal.  The state lotteries are even more concerned, and some are calling for a complete ban on online betting.  The evangelical churches and conservative parties are chiming in for ideological reasons.

At the end of 2023, Congress passed a law requiring online betting companies to be cleared for transparency and taxes by the Ministério da Fazenda.  They were required to register with the Ministry and provide required data by September 17 of this year.  To date 211 sites have been licensed, and new sites are being added to the list as their information is cleared.  The list appears here, and is constantly being updated:  https://www.gov.br/fazenda/pt-br/compos … e-empresas

On October 9, ANATEL began knocking unauthorized sites offline.

A new, more complete body of regulations is being prepared by Fazenda, and will become official in January.

A Congressional investigating commission has been empaneled, so more legislation can probably be expected in the new year.  Some of it is almost certain to deal with prohibiting the use of government transfer payments (e.g., Bolsa Família) for betting, and to address some of the concerns raised by the civil society groups and the states.

I was asked to invest in an online betting company 12 months ago, and although I declined (I do not gamble) I was given some information. Apparently online betting platforms could be accessed easily in Brazil, but none were based in Brazil - and so could not be taxed or controlled.

So the government invited new companies to start up and demonstrate they could operate legally and decently, with a view to licensing a couple of hundred that met the minimum requirements. Hundreds started, and, as @abthree has stated, some have already been successful with the planned deadline of January 2025.

It remains to be seen if this will be a good thing or bad for Brazil, but at least the online betting platforms will now be controlled in country and be of some benefit to Brazil's tax revenues...