Brazilian govt. expects to publish Provisional Measure regulating online gambling within the next few days

The Brazilian government is close to reaching a definition regarding the expected Provisional Measure that regulates online gambling in the country. After three months of promises, the executive branch assures that the measure will be published in the Official Gazette before the end of this month.

Almost a month ago, the text taxing online gambling companies was sent by the Minister of Finance, Fernando Haddad, to the Civil House, as reported by Yogonet. The regulation would establish that the government would keep 16% of the revenues of these companies.

Fernando Haddad

This was supposed to generate revenues to the Brazilian treasury of around BRL 15 billion per year (about $3 billion), although, in fact, it would be a far cry from those initial estimates. Today, Treasury officials expect the government to raise between BRL 1 billion and 2 billion.

There are currently around 3,000 sports betting sites operating in Brazil, all hosted abroad, moving around BRL 10 billion per year ($2.08 billion) without any taxation.

In addition to the tax measures that the Provisional Measure will have, the Ministry of Finance will create a secretariat to manage e-betting, which will be in charge of the collection of digital commerce and e-betting. Likewise, control mechanisms and prevention of fraudulent schemes will be established, such as the identification of the gambler.