Mariana Piccoli Lins Cavalcanti has been appointed Undersecretary of Sanctioning Action at Brazil's Secretariat of Prizes and Bets (SPA), placing her in a senior enforcement role within the country's federal betting regulator.
The appointment was published in the Official Gazette of the Union by the Presidency's Civil House. Cavalcanti will leave her current Government function to take the CCE 1.15 position at the Ministry of Finance.
The Sanctioning Action Subsecretariat is one of three subsecretariats within the SPA, alongside Authorization and Monitoring and Inspection. It is responsible for deciding administrative sanctioning proceedings at first instance, determining whether penalties should be imposed or cases closed and considering requests for reconsideration and review.
Cavalcanti has previously held roles within the Ministry of Finance. She was appointed to the Secretariat of Economic Reforms in 2023 and later worked as a coordinator-general. In April 2026, she moved to the Ministry of Management and Innovation in Public Services as an adviser within the Secretariat of Digital Government.
SPA expands enforcement framework
Her appointment comes during an expansion of Brazil's betting enforcement framework. In June, the Brazilian Government introduced procedures allowing accounts belonging to unauthorized fixed-odds betting operators to be blocked.
Further rules published by the SPA in September require financial institutions, payment institutions and payment arrangement providers to monitor transactions for indications of unauthorized betting activity. The framework covers transaction patterns, intermediaries and attempts to circumvent previous blocking measures.
Financial and payment institutions must block accounts belonging to identified irregular operators within 24 hours of receiving an SPA notification. They must also prevent new transactions intended to facilitate unauthorized betting and confirm compliance to the regulator.
The rules additionally require institutions to report suspected irregular betting activity to the SPA. The regulator can use those reports when determining whether an operator is conducting unauthorized fixed-odds betting.
Earlier this month, the SPA fined Pixbet BR$814,567.44 ($156,885) after the operator could not be located at its registered address. Pixbet was given 10 days to pay or appeal the penalty.
The SPA was established in 2024 and oversees federal authorization, regulation, monitoring, supervision and enforcement across Brazil's fixed-odds betting market
