Currently, the regulation of sports betting is in vogue in Brazil and mobilizing various actors in society. Football clubs and the Brazilian Football Confederation (CBF) have already asked the federal government to join this debate, but this issue was ignored by almost all teams four years ago.
The event ‘Brazilian self-regulation by the gaming sector’ took place in June 2019, in São Paulo. The only club with a representative was Vasco da Gama, which sent its then vice-president of Marketing, Bruno Maia.
According to Uol, the meeting was attended by relevant personalities such as Paulo Saad, vice-president of the Bandeirantes Group; Lorenzo Caci, director of Sportradar; Alessandro Valente, CEO of SuperAfiliados; as well as betting site executives.
Maia signed one of the first agreements with bookmakers for Vasco with NetBet. “Nobody paid attention to it when this phenomenon started in Brazil. I mean, no club. Now, everyone wants to participate because we have reached a level of absurd dependence. It was a sponsorship market that had already been falling in 2018 and 2019, but in 2020 it started to turn around just because of this betting segment”, said Bruno Maia, CEO of Feel The Match.
Betting regulation is being prepared by the Ministry of Finance
The Minister of Finance, Fernando Haddad, estimates that he will raise up to R$ 15 billion with taxation of betting sites. The statement was given to GloboNews last week. The minister will receive club leaders in Brasília to analyze the issue this Tuesday, 11.
The four big clubs in Rio de Janeiro and the big four in São Paulo issued a note, showing concern with the proposed changes to the law and requesting direct participation in the debates. The statement was released by Botafogo, Flamengo, Fluminense, Vasco, Corinthians, Palmeiras, São Paulo and Santos.
Subsequently, the CBF sent a new demand to the Ministry of Finance, asking for higher remuneration for football with the regulation of betting. Today, 39 of the 40 clubs in Series A and B are sponsored by bookmakers – the only exception being Cuiabá.
Current legislation
The current Law 13,756/2018 provides that 1.63% of the gross revenue from betting is passed on “to Brazilian sports entities that assign the rights to use their denominations, their brands, their emblems, their anthems, their symbols and the like for publicizing and executing the fixed odds betting lottery”.
In 2018, the then president of the republic, Michel Temer, sanctioned MP 846/2018 that legalized sports betting in the fixed quota model in the country. The measure provided for the allocation of the amounts obtained to areas of education, culture, sport and public safety.
