President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva published in the Official Gazette of the Union (DOU) this Wednesday (31) the creation of the Prizes and Bets Secretariat.

Linked to the Ministry of Finance, the department will be formed by the Sub-Secretariat of Authorization, the Sub-Secretariat of Monitoring and Inspection and the Sub-Secretariat of Sanctioning Action.

The secretariat will be responsible for authorizing, permitting and granting, regulating, standardizing, monitoring, supervising, inspecting and sanctioning the free distribution of prizes, fixed-odds bets and all types of lottery, including horse racing.

The government will issue the missing regulations regarding the regulation of sports betting through the Prizes and Betting Secretariat.

Responsibilities of the Secretariat

According to the publication in the DOU, the secretariat will be responsible for formulating, proposing, executing and supervising the betting and commercial promotions policy, providing the edition and maintenance of standards, manuals and technical instructions.

The folder must also:

• Provide the systems and other information technology solutions necessary for the development of its activities;
• Initiate administrative proceedings and apply administrative sanctions for violations of the law;
• Regulate, monitor and apply administrative sanctions;
• Enter into a commitment agreement in administrative processes aimed at investigating irregularities in the sector;
• Discipline penalties and the administrative sanctioning process for investigating administrative infractions;
• Provide rules to preserve responsible gaming, with the possibility of limiting the quantity, frequency and values ​​of bets per event or per bettor.

Subsecretariats

The Authorization Subsecretariat will be responsible for analyzing requests for authorization to operate fixed-odds betting in Brazil, in addition to free prize distribution contests and sweepstakes and lotteries held by horse racing promoters.

It will also propose criteria for granting authorizations issued by the Secretariat and support, through studies and technical analyses, the formulation of standards related to fixed-odds bets and other lottery modalities.

The Monitoring and Inspection Sub-Secretariat must supervise and monitor the actions of companies operating in the sector.

The sub-secretariat will also monitor the correct collection and transfer of taxes and compliance with bettors’ rights.

Finally, the Sub-Secretariat of Sanctioning Action is responsible for judging administrative sanctioning processes, deciding on the application of administrative sanctions and proposing the signing of a commitment term in administrative processes.