Casinos Bitcoin et crypto : Brésil, cadre légal

Is online betting legal in Brazil? No, not in November 2026

Online betting and online casino games are banned in Brazil. Provisional Measure (Medida Provisória, MP) 1,394 was published in the Diário Oficial da União on 25 September 2026 and took effect the same day. It prohibits the operation, offering, intermediation and advertising of fixed-odds betting anywhere in the country, online or in person. That covers sports betting and the “online games” category, so slots, roulette, crash games and live casino are all caught.

The ban applies to operators based abroad that take bets from people in Brazil, not only to companies that held a Brazilian licence. It also reaches the authorisations that some states and the Federal District had granted. Caixa lotteries such as Mega-Sena, Lotofácil and Quina, and other lotteries authorised by law, are not affected.

The MP is aimed at businesses and does not fine players. But it removes every lawful option: since 25 October 2026 the federal licences no longer exist, and any site still taking Brazilian players is operating illegally, whatever licence it shows.

Because of the ban we list no brands for Brazil, no bonuses and no links to betting sites. Our Portuguese-language guides go into more detail on what MP 1,394 bans and what it means for players and on why crypto casinos are not legal in Brazil.

How Brazil got here: from the 2018 law to the 2026 ban

Brazil’s licensed betting market lasted less than two years. Fixed-odds betting was first authorised by Law 13,756 of 12 December 2018, signed under President Michel Temer. The law left the detailed rules to the government, and they were not issued in time. For about five years offshore sites served Brazilians with no local licence.

Law 14,790 of 29 December 2023 filled that gap. It created a federal licensing system run by the Prizes and Betting Secretariat (Secretaria de Prêmios e Apostas, SPA) of the Ministry of Finance, added online casino games to the scope of fixed-odds betting and set a licence fee of R$30 million for five years. After a year of SPA ordinances on payments, advertising and identity checks, the licensed market opened on 1 January 2025, on .bet.br domains.

Concern about household debt and aggressive advertising kept growing, and on 25 September 2026, less than ten days before the first round of the presidential election, the government replaced regulation with prohibition.

What MP 1,394 does in practice

• Licences: the roughly 85 federal authorisations, held by just over 80 companies, were extinguished on 25 October 2026. Operators paid R$30 million each and get nothing back, and the MP rules out compensation. Most of Law 14,790 is revoked.
• Payments: banks, payment institutions and every participant in a payment scheme, Pix included, must refuse transactions destined for fixed-odds betting. The Central Bank wrote this into its rules with Resolution BCB 590 of 28 September 2026 and Resolutions 595, 596 and 597 of 30 September, covering TED, boletos and Pix. The only exception is money needed to close accounts and refund players.
• Blocking: the Ministries of Finance and Justice can order any betting site blocked. Anatel, the telecoms regulator, passes the orders to internet providers, and CGI.br handles .br domains. App stores have to remove betting apps.
• Advertising: all communication, advertising, marketing and sponsorship relating to fixed-odds betting is banned. Club shirt sponsorships were suspended.

A decree of 28 September 2026 set up an inter-agency enforcement committee, and on 13 October 2026 the Federal Police gained a permanent division for illegal betting and match-fixing.

One thing the MP does not do is create new crimes. A separate bill, PL 5,477/2026, sent to the Chamber of Deputies on 25 September, would make operating fixed-odds betting a crime (four to six years in prison) and set two to four years for promoting it or facilitating payments, including through crypto. Its urgency deadline in the Chamber ends on 12 November 2026, and as of late October it had no rapporteur. It is a proposal, not law.

What happened to player balances

If you had money on a licensed Brazilian betting site, the MP set out how you get it back. You did not have to apply for anything.

1. New deposits were barred from 25 September 2026.
2. Players could withdraw as normal until 23:59 on 5 October.
3. Bets still open at that point were cancelled and the full stake returned; bets settled before then were paid normally.
4. By 7 October operators had to send banks each player’s remaining balance, matched by CPF, together with the bank account used for deposits.
5. Banks paid those balances back between 9 and 14 October, preferably into the account the money came from, or into another account in the player’s name.
6. From 15 October, Caixa Econômica Federal holds and pays out any balance a bank could not return, for example because an account was closed or the data was wrong.

The sums were smaller than early headlines suggested. On 6 October the SPA reported R$1.325 billion still sitting with about 26.5 million players. After operators updated their data, the government said on 10 October that R$159 million remained to be returned, spread across 70.5 million accounts held by 22.5 million people. Ninety per cent of those accounts held less than R$1. No final tally of refunds had been published by early November.

Eight operators missed the deadline to send balance data, and the Attorney General’s Office (AGU) went to court. In late October federal courts in São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro froze their funds and ordered them to disclose players’ balances, with daily fines of R$50,000.

If you are still owed money

• Check the statement of the bank account you used for Pix or TED deposits.
• Keep screenshots of your betting balance, deposit receipts and any emails from the operator.
• If nothing arrived, contact Caixa through its official channels, or your own bank. The government’s Brasil sem Bets page (brasilsembets.gov.br) has the official guidance.
• Only the licensed .bet.br operators are part of this scheme. Balances at offshore sites are not covered, and nobody in Brazil can make those sites pay.

Why offshore and crypto casinos are not an alternative

With the licensed sites gone, adverts for “bitcoin casinos” and “bets with no registration” spread across Telegram, Instagram and WhatsApp. None of them is legal. The MP covers foreign operators that serve people in Brazil, and a licence from Curaçao, Anjouan or anywhere else gives no right to operate there.

Crypto was never a legal route either. Under SPA/MF Ordinance 615 of 16 April 2024, licensed operators could take money only by electronic transfer between the player’s own registered account and the operator’s account, both at institutions authorised by the Central Bank. Pix, TED and debit or prepaid cards were allowed; cash, boletos, credit cards, third-party payments and virtual assets or any other crypto-assets were prohibited. There has never been a licensed crypto casino in Brazil, and a return of the regulated market would not change that by itself.

Enforcement is large and growing, but it is a moving target. Between 25 September and 9 October 2026 the Ministry of Justice and the SPA sent 16,627 illegal sites for blocking and asked platforms to remove 3,691 pages, profiles and groups, including 1,027 Telegram groups. In late October the SPA was quoted as saying more than 100,000 illegal betting sites had been blocked, without explaining how that cumulative figure was counted. An industry-run monitoring system counted 60,477 suspected betting sites aimed at Brazilians by 27 October.

The real risks for players

• Sites vanish. A blocked domain can go dark overnight with your balance inside. Operators then move to a new address, and those “alternative addresses” are exactly where scammers wait.
• Withdrawals get refused. “No KYC” sites often ask for documents only when you try to cash out, then reject them, or close the account because you are in a country they are not allowed to serve. Brazil is now one of those countries.
• Crypto transfers cannot be reversed. There is no Pix MED (the special refund mechanism), no card chargeback and no Brazilian authority that can claw a payment back. Sending a stablecoin on the wrong network can lose it altogether.
• No consumer protection. Procon and the SPA cannot make an unlicensed foreign company pay. You depend entirely on the operator’s goodwill.
• No safety net. Illegal sites ignore the self-exclusion register and offer no deposit limits.

We do not suggest VPNs, mirror sites or any other way around a block, and we do not list any operator that accepts Brazilian players. Our general guide to crypto casino licences explains why an offshore licence offers so little protection anywhere.

Common scams after the ban

These are the patterns reported most often in October 2026:

• Fake government pages that copy gov.br or Brasil sem Bets, ask for your CPF and then charge a fee to “release” a balance.
• Clone sites that copy the look of former licensed brands but use .com, .net, .vip or .bet addresses instead of .bet.br.
• Telegram and WhatsApp groups selling “guaranteed signals” or bots for Aviator and Fortune-style games.
• Platforms that show a large winning balance but demand an advance “tax” or “release fee” before any withdrawal.

The rule is simple: nobody legitimate asks you to pay to receive your own money or a prize, and no one can guarantee winnings at a game of chance. Do not send money or crypto, do not share bank passwords or codes, and report the case to the police through your state’s online police station.

Tax on winnings already received

The ban does not erase what happened before it. Winnings from licensed sites remain subject to the income tax rules of Law 14,790/2023. As explained for the 2026 income tax return:

• 15% tax is due on net betting winnings above R$28,467.20 in the year.
• Winnings below that amount are exempt but still have to be declared.
• Losses on other bets cannot be deducted from winnings.

A balance returned by a bank in October 2026 is, in principle, your own money coming back rather than a new prize. Check the Receita Federal’s guidance or speak to an accountant before filing the 2027 return.

What could change next, and when

Three things could end or reshape the ban: Congress, the Supreme Court, or the MP simply running out of time.

Congress and the 120-day clock

A provisional measure has the force of law from publication but is temporary. It lasts 60 days and can be extended once for another 60, so up to 120 days in all; the count pauses during the parliamentary recess. If Congress does not convert it into law in time, it lapses. According to the Congress record, the first period of MP 1,394 runs to 23 November 2026, and from 9 November it blocks the agenda of the house where it sits. Amendments closed on 13 October.

Before either house can vote, a joint committee of deputies and senators has to report on the MP. As of late October it had not been installed and had no rapporteur. Congress can approve the text, change it (for example to allow some form of betting with stricter rules) or reject it. With the clock and the recess, a final vote could slip into early 2027.

The Supreme Court

Several direct actions of unconstitutionality (ADIs) challenge the MP: ADI 8024, filed by the association Anseja; ADI 8027, filed by the National Association of Games and Lotteries (ANJL) with the Brazilian Institute of Responsible Gambling (IBJR); ADI 8028, filed by an association of mayors and deputy mayors; and ADI 8035. All are with Justice Luiz Fux, who already handled the challenges to the 2023 betting law. On 6 October the AGU asked him to keep the ban in place.

Fux did not rule during the election campaign. President Lula was re-elected in the run-off on 25 October 2026, and on 26 October Fux left the MP in force and called a public hearing for 3 November 2026, under ADI 8027. Twenty-eight bodies are due to speak, from the CBF and ten football clubs to the AGU, the Prosecutor General’s Office and the industry associations; on 1 November, at the AGU’s request, he added the Ministries of Health and Justice. The hearing gathers evidence; it does not decide the case. Afterwards Fux could grant or refuse an injunction on his own or send the cases to the full court. No date has been set for that.

If the court suspended the MP, the earlier licensing rules could in principle apply again while the case continues, but with the licences already extinguished it is not clear how quickly any operator could legally reopen. A federal court in São Paulo had let one operator keep running until 25 October; reports say that decision was later overturned, which we have not been able to confirm from an official source.

Politics

President Lula, re-elected on 25 October, has said the ban should stay. The industry, many clubs and broadcasters want a new regulated model instead, while some lawmakers who voted for the 2023 law now back the ban. We will update this page when Congress votes, when the Supreme Court rules or if the MP lapses.

Getting help in Brazil

The end of legal betting can bring relief, but also anxiety, debts or the urge to find another site. You do not need to be in crisis to ask for help, and these services are free.

The Ministry of Finance’s centralised self-exclusion platform on gov.br has been live since 10 December 2025 and had recorded more than 1.1 million exclusions by August 2026. Illegal sites ignore it, so a gambling blocker on your phone and computer, and a limit on bank transfers to crypto exchanges, do more against offshore sites.

Avoid borrowing to win back losses; it is one of the most common traps. Our responsible gambling guide covers warning signs and practical limits, and the responsible gambling hub lists services in other countries. Gambling content on this site is for adults aged 18 and over.

Why we list no operators for Brazil

We only list an operator where playing there is lawful for the reader. That is not the case in Brazil, so this page shows no brands, bonuses or affiliate links. If the ban is suspended, changed or allowed to lapse, we will review the market from scratch; our coverage page shows every market we follow.

This page is general information, not legal or tax advice. The situation changes week by week, so check the Ministry of Finance, the Congress record and the Diário Oficial da União before acting on it.