Presidential campaigns diverge on how to handle Brazil's betting sector

Economic advisors for five of Brazil's leading Presidential candidates addressed betting regulation among other economic topics during a two-hour debate in São Paulo. 

The event brought together representatives for the six candidates polling highest in the latest Quaest survey, the current President’s, Lula da Silva, Flávio Bolsonaro, Augusto Cury, Ronaldo Caiado, Renan Santos and Romeu Zema, though only Bolsonaro's campaign sent no representative.

What new betting rules could Brazil introduce after the election?

• Representing Lula: Finance Minister Dario Durigan defended treating the betting sector with the same rigor Brazil has applied to tobacco, through heavy taxation and strict restrictions.  He noted the current administration regulated betting, banned social beneficiaries from Bolsa Família and BPC and the debt relief program participants from betting platforms, and prohibited prediction markets earlier this year.

• Deputy Luiz Carlos Hauly, representing Cury, said the campaign's official position favors higher taxation on betting, though he personally supports banning betting advertising entirely and eliminating both betting platforms and online games, criticizing the presence of football players in betting commercials. 

• Deputy Kim Kataguiri, representing Santos, proposed regulating betting the way Brazil tackled tobacco, requiring betting sites to display gambling's harms prominently on their own pages. 

• Carlos da Costa, representing Zema, said the campaign holds a firm anti-betting stance, backing a full ban on all forms of sports betting as a political decision. 

• Roberto Brandt, representing Caiado, favored a total ban on betting advertising in media and sports organizations but cautioned that banning betting outright could push the sector into illegality.

While a total ban remains unlikely in the country, the next round of betting measures is expected to come after the election.