Lula da Silva has made Brazilian political history by becoming the first presidential election candidate to win the second round of voting after losing the first, the only time this has happened since the country became a democracy once again in 1985.
The left-wing President has been re-elected for a fourth term, proving both opinion polls and prediction markets dead wrong. Lula won 51.79% of the vote, over four million more votes than Flavio Bolsonaro, who walked away with 48.21%.
Right-wing candidate and Liberal Party leader Bolsonaro is calling for the election to be annulled due to a last minute Supreme Court decision to allow polling to continue for a further two hours, but this is unlikely.
However, it is certainly not a victory for the country’s gambling industry. Just nine days before the first round of voting was held on 4 October, Lula announced his intention to reverse the 2024 ‘Bets Law’ – legislation he himself had approved in late 2024 and which launched Brazil’s regulated online betting market on 1 January 2025.
Can Brazilian betting be saved?
So, with Lula firmly back in the offices of the Palácio do Planalto, where does the legitimacy of Brazil’s unloved gambling framework stand?
Initially, some hope lay with the opposition candidate, Bolsonaro, son of former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro.
A right-wing politician, Bolsonaro had toyed with the idea of a betting ban as well, but his Liberal Party also has more business sympathies within it, and he ultimately criticised Lula’s decision to ban betting as a pre-election political play. Yet at no point did the LIberal Party or Flavio detail outright support for online gambling, citing that drastic reforms were required to overhaul the regime.
The avenue of a change of president is now firmly closed, however. And the legislative and political situation is, to put it simply, complex.
Lula’s ban came in the form of a Provisional Measure (PM), an emergency presidential decree designed to come into effect within 60-120 days. In the coming days Congress will unveil which political blocs carry Lula’s interests.
Bookmakers were given until 25 October to close up completely, though player account withdrawals had to be completed by 5 October. PM’s can be shut down by Congress, however, and this is where betting’s hopes will lie.
Congressional elections were also held this month, with the LIberal Party expanding its presence in the Chamber of Deputies to 121 deputies and in the Senate to 29.
The diverse range of political representation in both chambers means a congressional rejection or amendment of Lula’s MP remains a distinct possibility.
There undoubtedly are many more voices sympathetic to the industry and more in favour of gambling regulation over prohibition in congress than there are in the federal government.
Finally, the industry’s other big hope lies in the Supreme Court. The MP could be struck down by Justice Luiz Fux.
This would not lead to operators being reissued their five licences – the revoking of which has already prompted some firms to threaten legal action – but would at least stop the ban in its tracks and allow operators and favourable legislators to begin crafting a new licensing framework.
Regulus: Brazil’s bookies in limbo
Regulus Partners, a global strategic advisory business, stated shortly after the election that it does not see Fux revoking the ban as a likely scenario. The company does not expect the PM to last, but also does not expect the licences held by operators in 2025-2026 to return either.
This would leave the sector “in limbo”, a Regulus Blog post reads.
“This scenario is likely to be resolved by more protracted lawfare, in our view,” the firm added.
“If Lula’s allies achieve concrete legal progress in suing the post-licensed sector for player losses, then this will probably bury the industry despite the lack of legal clarity on the ban.”
All in all, regulated betting Brazil is far from dead and buried. The sector still has some legislative and judicial paths to survival, but the way it is regulated and structured will undoubtedly be changed forever.
A scenario many industry stakeholders expect is for legal sports betting to make a return, but for online casinos to be gone for good due to its association with higher levels of addiction, harm, and negative societal impacts.
Investment into the sector will undoubtedly change too, however. Many major international firms – Flutter Entertainment, Kaizen Gaming, Super Technologies, Entain and bet365, to name a few – have been investing and hiring locally over the past two years.
But with a self-described “no friend of gambling” back in the president’s position for a fourth term, the risk of future investments has risen considerably.
Lula: moralist or pragmatist?
Lula has been stung before in his attempts to reform online gambling.
In 2025, the first year of the Bets regime, the President and former finance minister Fernando Haddad were embarrassed by a botched attempt to double gambling taxes, with the Workers’ Party (PT) failing to secure sufficient support in Congress.
In the background, the PT is conscious of the legal challenges that could follow should the President’s measures become law, including potential compensation claims from the football, media and IT sectors.
Lula adopted a moral stance when campaigning on his decision to ban online gambling. But could a fourth term bring a more pragmatic approach to an issue that risks putting the PT at odds with key sectors of Brazil’s economy?
In the short-term, the future of online gambling remains largely in the hands of Congress, but Lula has won the right to dictate the terms of its comeback…
Article coauthored with Ted Menmuir
Is Lula’s re-election the final nail in Brazil’s betting industry’s coffin?
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Lula da Silva has made Brazilian political history by becoming the first presidential election candidate to win the second round of voting after losing the first, the only time this has happened since the country became a democracy once again in 1985.
The left-wing President has been re-elected for a fourth term, proving both opinion polls and prediction markets dead wrong. Lula won 51.79% of the vote, over four million more votes than Flavio Bolsonaro, who walked away with 48.21%.
Right-wing candidate and Liberal Party leader Bolsonaro is calling for the election to be annulled due to a last minute Supreme Court decision to allow polling to continue for a further two hours, but this is unlikely.
However, it is certainly not a victory for the country’s gambling industry. Just nine days before the first round of voting was held on 4 October, Lula announced his intention to reverse the 2024 ‘Bets Law’ – legislation he himself had approved in late 2024 and which launched Brazil’s regulated online betting market on 1 January 2025.
Can Brazilian betting be saved?
So, with Lula firmly back in the offices of the Palácio do Planalto, where does the legitimacy of Brazil’s unloved gambling framework stand?
Initially, some hope lay with the opposition candidate, Bolsonaro, son of former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro.
A right-wing politician, Bolsonaro had toyed with the idea of a betting ban as well, but his Liberal Party also has more business sympathies within it, and he ultimately criticised Lula’s decision to ban betting as a pre-election political play. Yet at no point did the LIberal Party or Flavio detail outright support for online gambling, citing that drastic reforms were required to overhaul the regime.
The avenue of a change of president is now firmly closed, however. And the legislative and political situation is, to put it simply, complex.
Lula’s ban came in the form of a Provisional Measure (PM), an emergency presidential decree designed to come into effect within 60-120 days. In the coming days Congress will unveil which political blocs carry Lula’s interests.
Bookmakers were given until 25 October to close up completely, though player account withdrawals had to be completed by 5 October. PM’s can be shut down by Congress, however, and this is where betting’s hopes will lie.
Congressional elections were also held this month, with the LIberal Party expanding its presence in the Chamber of Deputies to 121 deputies and in the Senate to 29.
The diverse range of political representation in both chambers means a congressional rejection or amendment of Lula’s MP remains a distinct possibility.
There undoubtedly are many more voices sympathetic to the industry and more in favour of gambling regulation over prohibition in congress than there are in the federal government.
Finally, the industry’s other big hope lies in the Supreme Court. The MP could be struck down by Justice Luiz Fux.
This would not lead to operators being reissued their five licences – the revoking of which has already prompted some firms to threaten legal action – but would at least stop the ban in its tracks and allow operators and favourable legislators to begin crafting a new licensing framework.
Regulus: Brazil’s bookies in limbo
Regulus Partners, a global strategic advisory business, stated shortly after the election that it does not see Fux revoking the ban as a likely scenario. The company does not expect the PM to last, but also does not expect the licences held by operators in 2025-2026 to return either.
This would leave the sector “in limbo”, a Regulus Blog post reads.
“This scenario is likely to be resolved by more protracted lawfare, in our view,” the firm added.
“If Lula’s allies achieve concrete legal progress in suing the post-licensed sector for player losses, then this will probably bury the industry despite the lack of legal clarity on the ban.”
All in all, regulated betting Brazil is far from dead and buried. The sector still has some legislative and judicial paths to survival, but the way it is regulated and structured will undoubtedly be changed forever.
A scenario many industry stakeholders expect is for legal sports betting to make a return, but for online casinos to be gone for good due to its association with higher levels of addiction, harm, and negative societal impacts.
Investment into the sector will undoubtedly change too, however. Many major international firms – Flutter Entertainment, Kaizen Gaming, Super Technologies, Entain and bet365, to name a few – have been investing and hiring locally over the past two years.
But with a self-described “no friend of gambling” back in the president’s position for a fourth term, the risk of future investments has risen considerably.
Lula: moralist or pragmatist?
Lula has been stung before in his attempts to reform online gambling.
In 2025, the first year of the Bets regime, the President and former finance minister Fernando Haddad were embarrassed by a botched attempt to double gambling taxes, with the Workers’ Party (PT) failing to secure sufficient support in Congress.
In the background, the PT is conscious of the legal challenges that could follow should the President’s measures become law, including potential compensation claims from the football, media and IT sectors.
Lula adopted a moral stance when campaigning on his decision to ban online gambling. But could a fourth term bring a more pragmatic approach to an issue that risks putting the PT at odds with key sectors of Brazil’s economy?
In the short-term, the future of online gambling remains largely in the hands of Congress, but Lula has won the right to dictate the terms of its comeback…
Article coauthored with Ted Menmuir