Brazilian regulator confirms plan to ban welfare recipients from online gambling
The move could exclude close to 60 million people from online gambling in Brazil.
Brazil.- Regis Dudena, secretary of Brazil’s new gambling regulator, the SPA, has confirmed that the Ministry of Finance still intends to block welfare recipients from gambling. The measure had been proposed by the Supreme Court last year due to concerns about people using benefits payments to gamble.
Dudena said in an interview that the measure was still in the final stages, but that the intention was to prohibit gambling for people who receive the Bolsa Familiar and Continuous Benefit Payment (BPC), two of the most common state welfare plans in Brazil.
The Bolsa Familiar, which supports families below the poverty line, is received by over 54 million people. The BPC is received by over 5.8 million people aged 65 and over. Together, that would mean that close to a third of the country’s population of 212 million would be excluded from legal online gambling. While the intention is to prevent gambling losses among the poorest in Brazilian society, operators argue that the move will push these players to the black market.
Meanwhile, the SPA has invited Brazilian states to meet to discuss the possibility of closer alignment between federal gambling regulations and those at the state level. Each state has been invited to send a representative to meeting at the Ministry of Finance in Brasília on Friday (April 4)
There have been clashes over the dual regulatory systems since the federal online gambling framework launched on January 1. In particular, Rio de Janeiro’s state lottery, Loterj, has found itself in conflict with the national regulator as it argued that its licensees should be allowed to provide gambling nationally. It has since told Rio gambling licensees to apply geoblocking controls and only accept players within the state.
State lotteries have expressed opposition to a rule that requires regulated gambling platforms to use .bet.br internet domain names. Analome, the National Association of Municipal and State Lotteries, says the rule threatens the activities of the municipal and state lotteries using other domains.
However, the SPA believes that a national gambling system would provide more clarity for players while also ensuring that all operators adhere to minimum responsible gambling and anti-money laundering standards.
In the ongoing Parliamentary Inquiry Commission (CPI) enquiry into Brazil’s new online gambling framework, senator Damares Alves (Republicanos-DF) has called for tighter controls. Alves criticised currently “unregulated coverage” of gambling on digital and social media and said that legislators should intervene.
She’s calling for tighter time limits on gameplay, identity verification and rules for advertising that uses celebrity endorsements or links to major sporting events. She argued that operators “exploit emotional and psychological manipulation of consumers, in their marketing tactics”.
The SPA announced in February that it would begin work on the creation of a Brazilian gambling self-exclusion scheme as it moves attention to the second phase of its regulatory work following the launch of the online gambling market.
The SPA wants the exclusion system to track people who are prohibited from betting by law, such as athletes and SPA employees, as well as people who self-exclude voluntarily, either from gaming or related advertising. The regulator is seeking input from stakeholders, including gaming operators, banks, local authorities, media and healthcare networks owing to the technical complexities of the project.
