Brazil sends 10,000 betting sites to blocks as R$ 1.453 billion remains in player withdrawals

Brazil’s federal government has sent more than 10,000 betting sites to Anatel for blocking since Friday, 26 September, after a provisional measure banned bets in the country. The move matters for PSPs and acquirers because the government says the daily flow into these platforms, which had reached R$ 600 million, has been “basically annulled.”

1. The Ministry of Finance said on Friday, 3 October, that more than 10,000 sites were forwarded to Anatel for blocking this week, adding to about 78,000 that had already been taken down by the previous Friday. Dario Durigan, the finance minister, said the newly forwarded domains should go offline “within hours,” though that still needs to be confirmed with the agency.
2. According to Durigan, the betting traffic into the platforms had reached R$ 600 million per day before the ban. He said that flow has now been “basically annulled,” which is the relevant part for payment providers: once the state starts blocking access at scale, the money trail tends to get reviewed right alongside the websites.
3. Players have until 23:59 on Monday, 5 October, to withdraw funds held on the platforms. The Ministry of Finance said R$ 1.453 billion is still awaiting withdrawal, spread across 28.65 million CPFs with positive balances. For operators and PSPs, that is not a theoretical backlog; it is a very large mass of retail balances under a fixed deadline.
4. The government is also going after the operators themselves. Bank accounts of companies that keep recreating clandestine pages, concentrated in a small number of financial institutions and payment companies, are being blocked. Durigan said some funds are already frozen, with the total still being finalised with the Central Bank (BC); after an administrative process, the assets are expected to be seized and sent to public security.
5. Authorities also said they identified 48 accounts with balances above R$ 500,000, supposedly held by individuals, and those will face detailed review. Durigan did not rule out money laundering, saying the pattern differs from the bulk of betting-related accounts and could be subject to investigation. Cases are being sent to Senacon, Sedigi and the Federal Police (PF), while Wellington César announced a new enforcement department at Senacon and a general anti-money-laundering coordination unit at the PF focused on the link between bets and organised crime.

For high-risk payment firms, the signal is straightforward: Brazil is not just blocking domains. It is moving on the accounts, the balances, and the institutions sitting in the middle.