President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva signed Decree 13,033 on June 19, giving Brazil’s federal government the power to freeze and ultimately confiscate the financial assets of unlicensed betting operators — the most direct enforcement mechanism the country has used since legalising fixed-odds betting in 2023.
The decree was signed alongside Finance Minister Dario Durigan and Justice and Public Security Minister Wellington César Lima e Silva. It regulates Article 21-A of Law No. 14,790/2023, the fixed-odds betting law, using provisions added this year through Brazil’s Anti-Fraud Law — a package originally designed to disrupt the financial networks of organised crime.
Block para o jogo ilegal! ✋🚫
Ao lado do ministro da Fazenda, Dario Durigan, e do ministro da Justiça e Segurança Pública, Wellington César Lima e Silva, assinei hoje uma nova medida que garante o bloqueio de recursos financeiros de empresas ilegais de apostas.
Com a nova Lei… pic.twitter.com/e1t5xD7goA
— Lula (@LulaOficial) June 19, 2026
How the blocking mechanism works
When the Finance Ministry’s betting regulator identifies an unlicensed operator, banks and payment firms must freeze the associated accounts within 24 hours and halt new transactions. Those institutions then have 48 hours to confirm compliance. Any funds eventually declared forfeit go to the National Public Security Fund, earmarked for combating organised crime.
The government has already identified 37 financial firms — mostly fintechs and payment companies — as processors of illegal betting funds. A companion measure, Ordinance No. 1,766/2026, issued on June 17, makes banks and payment providers jointly liable for an unlicensed operator’s unpaid taxes if they continue processing transactions after receiving a formal warning. Advertisers are also covered under the joint-liability order.
The official Finance Ministry framing describes the approach as “financial asphyxiation” — cutting off revenue flows rather than relying on website blocking alone, which has proven difficult to enforce at scale.
The context: a market under regulatory pressure
Brazil’s regulated betting market generated approximately $7 billion in GGR in its first full regulated year, but the illegal segment has continued to operate alongside it. Earlier attempts to address unlicensed operators focused on domain-level blocks; this decree shifts the focus upstream to payment infrastructure.
The move fits a pattern of escalating pressure from the Lula administration. In April, the Workers’ Party tabled a bill to ban fixed-odds betting outright, and the government separately moved to ban prediction markets and block 27 platforms via national telecoms regulator Anatel. The decree signed this week is narrower in scope — it targets illegal operators within an otherwise legal framework rather than the framework itself.
The 37 financial firms flagged by the ministry illustrate how deeply payment processing for illegal operators is embedded in the fintech sector. Under Ordinance 1,766/2026, those firms face not just account freezes but joint tax liability — meaning they can be held responsible for tax obligations tied to the illegal bets they facilitated if they fail to act after notification.
What happens next
The Central Bank of Brazil oversees the enforcement process under the decree. Once an operator is flagged, the 24- and 48-hour compliance windows move quickly, and institutions that miss them face both regulatory and tax exposure. The Finance Ministry has indicated it expects the mechanism to be operational immediately, with no transition period.
The broader question is whether payment-level enforcement proves more durable than domain blocking. Brazil’s experience mirrors regulatory moves in Turkey, which accelerated its illegal gambling crackdown through financial enforcement reforms in 2026, suggesting this is becoming a standard tool in markets where operator-level enforcement has stalled.
For the licensed segment of Brazil’s market, the decree reduces one source of competitive distortion — illegal operators running at lower cost because they avoid tax and compliance. Whether that benefit materialises depends on how consistently the Finance Ministry pursues flagging and how quickly banks act on the 24-hour freeze requirement.
Source: Brazilian Ministry of Finance
