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Brazil’s gambling regulator has published the names of nearly 200 whitelisted betting sites that will not be subject to blocking during the final months of a transition period to a national licensing regime.

The Brazilian Ministry of Finance published two separate whitelists late in the evening on Tuesday (October 1), as officials followed through with a recent initiative to allow only operators that have applied for a licence to continue accepting bets in Brazil through to the end of a transition period that will expire at the start of next year.

A of pending applicants for a federal licence comprises 193 online betting and casino skins operated by a total of 88 companies.

Those 88 operators are drawn from the 114 that applied prior to an initial August 20 deadline plus four others — Parimatch, BRX Gaming, Nexus International and Marjosports — that all submitted applications on the same day that a new licensing ordinance was published to ban any operators yet to apply from operating in Brazil effective from October 1.  

That September 17 ordinance required applicants to submit an additional form specifying the brands and domains they currently use to offer online bets to Brazilians.

Any online betting sites that are not whitelisted will now be subject to blocking, with finance minister Fernando Haddad earlier this week stating that he expects up to 600 platforms to be blocked by telecoms authority Anatel within the coming days. 

Brazilian regulations had initially allowed for all operators to remain active in the country up until January 1, when new legal prohibitions become effective for any unlicensed platforms.

But the decision to pull up the drawbridge three months early followed mounting media and political concerns of problem gambling and irresponsible marketing practices in Brazil’s unregulated market, including by offshore operators that likely have no intention of ever obtaining a licence.

“This measure provides more security for society and for those companies that want to operate properly in Brazil,” said Régis Dudena, secretary of the Ministry of Finance’s Secretariat for Prizes and Bets (SPA), in a statement announcing publication of the whitelisted sites.  “With this, we are protecting the mental and financial health of players.”

Alongside the longer whitelist of national licence applicants, the finance ministry also published a of six online betting sites that have been licensed in the states of Paraná and Maranhão.

The SPA said that second whitelist came about after the federal regulator contacted state governments in all 26 Brazilian states “asking that they send a list of companies authorised at state level”.  

Conspicuous by their absence from the list of state-level licensees are any of those that have been authorised by the state of Rio de Janeiro, which has been less than cooperative with the federal government's mandate to institute a national licensing system.

The two whitelists were published just a few hours after Rio state lottery authority Loterj obtained an injunction from a federal judge in Brasilia to protect any Rio-licensed operators from potential blocking. 

Via a 2023 decree, Loterj has expressly authorised its operators to accept bets from throughout Brazil, on grounds that the wagers are legally accepted within its borders, and insists they should not require a federal licence to operate or advertise on a national basis.

In his ruling, Judge Antonio Claudio Macedo da Silva agreed that the SPA’s September 17 ordinance to block any operators not applying for a federal licence was incompatible with Loterj’s own licensing decree and would have “immediate impacts” on the state of Rio de Janeiro.

Five of Rio’s eight local licensees have also applied for a federal licence and are on the national whitelist, but three are not. 

Dudena told the Folha de S.Paulo newspaper that Brazil’s attorney general’s office would study the court decision granted in favour of Loterj, but added it was not a cause for concern to prevent publication of the whitelist of approved operators.

As of Tuesday, the SPA has received a total of 185 applications for federal licences to offer sports betting and online gaming. That includes 73 new applicants that have stepped forward since its September 17 ordinance.

Only applications submitted by August 20 are guaranteed a response in time to go live on day one of Brazil’s regulated market on January 1.