Polymarket keeps Brazil election markets open despite CMN block and VPN access

Polymarket, the New York-based prediction market, is still listing at least 40 betting markets on Brazil’s 2026 elections even though Brazil’s National Monetary Council (CMN) ordered the platform blocked in April. For high-risk payments people, the interesting bit is not the politics; it is that the platform is still reachable via VPN and continues to rely on crypto rails, which makes access and payment controls harder to enforce in practice.

1. The Estadão found open markets on September 10 for Brazil’s presidency, state governorships and the Federal Senate. Polymarket operates with cryptocurrencies and lets users place bets on hundreds of events around the world.
2. The Brazilian Ministry of Finance said it is monitoring platforms offering irregular betting in Brazil and has already sent more than 68,000 sites for blocking. “The fight against the illegal market is continuous, since irregular operators may use different mechanisms to try to circumvent access restrictions,” the ministry said. The Superior Electoral Court (TSE) declined to comment, and Polymarket did not respond to contact requests.
3. The CMN ban does not fully stop Brazilian users from reaching the platform. VPNs can mask the origin of the connection, and VPN use itself is not prohibited under Brazilian law.
4. Taís Gasparian, a lawyer specializing in digital law, said a VPN is “a neutral tool, which allows data privacy and security,” but using it to bypass CMN restrictions is an unlawful act. She said users who do this could face civil, tax and criminal liability, and that any gains obtained can also be reached by the courts. VPN providers must keep access logs under Brazil’s Marco Civil da Internet, which can make user identification possible if a Brazilian court orders the data.
5. On payments, Pix deposits are not available on Polymarket in Brazil even when a VPN is used. Crypto remains the other route around the payment barriers. The platform also lists prediction markets on elections in São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Minas Gerais, Pernambuco, Bahia and 15 other federal units, plus bets on whether candidates will attend TV debates and whether Supreme Federal Court justice Alexandre de Moraes could be removed from office.

Because Polymarket is not based in Brazil, the CMN resolution has limited reach over its operations. That is the real operating issue here: if a platform can stay live, take crypto, and rely on VPN access, a local block becomes more of a compliance signal than a hard stop.