Brazil requires gambling ads to warn about addiction and losses

Brazil made it mandatory on Friday for gambling advertisements to carry warnings about addiction and money loss, tightening rules on a betting sector that has grown quickly in recent years.

Brazil's betting market has expanded since a regulatory framework was established in 2023. The report said the growth has been accompanied by aggressive advertising on streets and online, including from influencers and sports stars.

Controversy rose during the World Cup, when YouTube channel CazeTV, which streamed all matches live to millions of people, showed QR codes for betting and recommended specific wagers. After an investigation by the country's consumer protection agency, the channel reduced those ads.

Finance Minister Dario Durigan said the goal of the new rules was to treat betting like cigarettes by requiring warnings in advertisements. Official figures show that most people using betting platforms come from poor households. A study by the National Confederation of Commerce estimated that betting-related debt pushed almost 270,000 families into severe default over about three years.

Ana Clara Costa, a 21-year-old market vendor in Copacabana, said people who bet are often not financially stable and may believe misleading advertising while trying to change their lives.

Some cities are going further than the national rules. In Rio de Janeiro, municipal workers this week covered billboards with the message: "Betting ad REMOVED." The Gaming and Lottery Association called such measures an unfounded attack and said it would act against them.

Lawyer Juliana Prates said she has tried to fight the industry since her brother took his own life last year because of gambling debts. She said she filed a complaint after football star Neymar promoted a betting brand to his tens of millions of followers, but received no response. She said there was a lack of will to solve the problem because a lot of money was involved.

Brazilian influencer Virginia Fonseca is facing a lawsuit after recommending to her 56 million Instagram followers that they place a bet on Cape Verde beating Argentina during the World Cup.

Rodrigo Leite of the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro said public figures had more influence than traditional commercials and that Brazilians needed better financial education. He said the average Brazilian did not have protection against betting.

Official data said 25.2 million Brazilians placed bets in 2025, in a country of 213 million people. President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has described the spread of betting as a public health issue, even though his government collects billions of reais in taxes from the sector.