Brazil’s September 25th betting ban puts legal certainty in question

On September 25th, 2026, President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva signed Provisional Measure 1,394/2026, which effectively bans fixed-odds betting across Brazil. For operators, PSPs, and acquirers, the problem is not just the ban itself; it is the fact that Brazil moved from a licensed market to a shutdown order less than two years after building the framework.

1. The measure prohibits the operation, offering, intermediation, and advertising of sports betting and online games, and gives existing federal, state, and district authorizations 30 days to end. It also says operators are not entitled to reimbursement of authorization fees or compensation from the government.
2. This is a reversal of Law 14,790/2023, under which Brazil created a system for operators to seek authorization, pay substantial fees, meet technical and financial requirements, and operate under supervision by the Ministry of Finance’s Secretariat of Prizes and Betting.
3. The government’s own database listed dozens of authorized companies before the MP was issued, including Betano, Betnacional, Sportingbet, KTO, Betsson, Superbet, and Rei do Pitaco. These names matter because they were operating inside a framework the Brazilian state had explicitly chosen to regulate, not in some grey market accident.
4. The timing is what makes this a regulatory event, not just a policy announcement. Reuters reported that the MP was signed nine days before October 4th, the first round of the presidential election, during a period of intense electoral competition, with Senator Flávio Bolsonaro among Lula’s principal opponents.
5. That does not prove an electoral motive, but it does leave the market with a familiar and expensive problem: a licensed vertical can be built, taxed, supervised, and then effectively turned off by the same state that sold it the license in the first place. For payment providers, that is the kind of legal certainty that usually sends risk teams reaching for the coffee and the exit memo at the same time.

Brazilian media have also questioned whether the measure is tied to the electoral environment, especially after Lula and members of his government increased their criticism of betting in the weeks before the decision. The practical point for high-risk payment providers is simpler: when a regulated market can be shut down by Provisional Measure 1,394/2026, the licensing file matters less than the next political calendar.