Brazil’s Quaest poll shows Lula at 39% and Flávio Bolsonaro at 34% after betting ban takes effect

A new Quaest survey gives President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva 39% in the first round, with Senator Flávio Bolsonaro at 34%. For high-risk payment operators, the point is not the polling horse race itself but the policy backdrop: this is the first institute poll after the federal government’s ban on fixed-odds betting, including sports betting and online games.

1. Quaest, commissioned by Grupo Globo, was published on Monday and comes less than a week before Brazilians vote. The margin of error is two percentage points.
2. Besides Lula and Flávio Bolsonaro, the poll puts writer Augusto Cury at 4%, former Goiás governor Ronaldo Caiado at 4%, activist Renan Santos at 3%, and former Minas Gerais governor Romeu Zema at 1%. The article says this group’s vote share has fallen over the course of the election period.
3. In the previous round, released a week earlier, Lula had 37% and Flávio had 33%. Cury was at 6%, Caiado at 4%, Renan at 3%, and Zema at 1%, which means the main movement in this round is not at the top but in the lower-intent field.
4. The interviews were conducted between 24 and 27 September, so the poll partially captured the effect of Lula’s betting ban announced on the evening of 25 September. The survey covered 2,004 voters, carried 95% confidence, and was registered with Brazil’s electoral authorities under code BR-06520/2026.
5. The provisional measure bans the operation, offering, intermediation, and advertising of fixed-odds betting, including sports betting and online games. From publication of the measure, new deposits on platforms were prohibited; users have until 23:59 on 5 October to withdraw available funds voluntarily; sites and apps must go offline the next day; and remaining balances will be returned by banks between 9 and 14 October.

The same measure also ends advertising and new sponsorship contracts for betting companies, while existing materials and sponsorships can stay up until 5 October. It also calls for stronger enforcement against platforms that keep operating illegally — the sort of detail PSPs, acquiring teams, and banking partners tend to read before they read the rest of the headline.