In an election year, in which macroeconomics and political conduct are more important than a technical reflection coming from a sector that has been waiting for its regulation for almost four years, taking advantage of the months before October to refine studies and improve the content of the Decree would be as productive as not invoking this agenda until the election, keeping religious-conservative support untouched.
After years of inaction by the Ministry of Economy, precisely since December 12, 2018 when law 13,756 was sanctioned by the then President of the Republic, Michel Temer, the Civil House recently showed initiative in conducting the fixed-quota lottery, a popular sports bet, showing that “great is the enemy of good” especially when the market begs for a regulation and the segment breaks records in monetary movement.
The growth in the numbers of this economic activity, legal and regulated in the overwhelming majority of countries, can be clearly deduced by any layman who turns on the television, notices the brands on stadiums and football jerseys, browses the internet and cannot fail to notice impactful advertisements and the increasing prominence that “BET” type companies conquer in the media, currently being the biggest advertisers of numerous portals, TV shows, football teams, sporting events, from advertising boards pulverized from airports to bars, from organized supporters to websites with diverse content, invariably with active idols, or former famous athletes, offering welcome bonuses to get to know the brand that hired them for gold weight.
With such a prosperous and inviting market, why doesn't Brazil, the country of football, take advantage of part of this wealth that flows arbitrarily, including abroad, and legally channels a fair share to the public coffers, generating collection, control, internal income, new qualifications, jobs, investment in sport, guarantees for bettors and immediate social benefits?
Firstly, because the Ministry of Economy did not have the competence, nor will it have the competence to conduct the management of the sector. And now, even with the help of the Civil House, we have elections and the word “bet” refers to “gambling” that refers to a mistaken concept of a cultural order, without the slightest critical and rational basis, which chills the evangelical bench and makes it be against for being against any demand with this theme.
Among the electoral support of evangelical friends to maintain the current political leadership, which allowed so many advances in dormant agendas, some even discredited, and which now motivate and inspire the world to invest in the last giant to be regulated, as well as preserve stability and growth of the economy, so important for a scenario of heavy investment coming from abroad, to immediately publish a decree with flaws and important absences, postponing the enactment was a sensible act, despite the continuity of the macroeconomic scenario being more important than the regulation of any sector, however promising it may be.
Faced with the risk of exchanging the right for the dubious, the support of conservatives and Protestants is very important, as big as the bill they impose on the public coffers with this request they made to the president and with the bench in Congress acting against and delaying the votes of this agenda, a trifle of approximately 10 billion reais a year just in taxes.
Deputy Marco Feliciano aimed at the election, but hit another target by extending the publication of the decree to after the elections, providing another opportunity for the Executive to improve the text of the draft that was leaked in the press, affected by absences and a marketing vision still distant from the Brazilian reality.
Brazil has more than 2,000 sports betting sites, almost all pirated or semi-legalised, operating freely and propagating that they are “within the law”, both because the public authorities allowed it to do so by not enacting the regulation, transforming the market in “lawless land”, and because they claim that they are certified by an international license issued in Curaçao, Malta or the Isle of Man.
In fact, they use these licenses and commit a double tax and operational evasion, with the person who licenses not having the slightest control over the activity carried out on the Brazilian continent, not collecting the fees for pseudo financial transactions in both countries, not communicating the tax base country when paying a prize in Brazil, where it is assumed that the capital backing the operation is deposited, and the opposite is also evaded, when remitting a deposit made in Brazil that should be sent to the tax base, generating tax evasion and fiscal crimes in both countries, among other crimes.
The wording is still fragile and incomplete, if it remains intact, it will give rise to numerous actions by the Police and the Federal Revenue, at the same time that it will discourage the best international consortia from investing in Brazil, as it provides some informal activities and operations in a more advantageous way than recognized legal protocols. Repairing absences and failures through MPs and Ordinances, as has been ventilated in Brasília, are technical-executive mechanisms that do not straighten a wall that is born with a crooked base, the decree needs to be revised, improved, and not patched up.
The current proposal seems to be more concerned with facilitating public management itself than providing opportunities for the Brazilian people, who should be the main beneficiary. A single fee of 22.2 million reais does not democratize or prioritize the internal business community. Focusing on capital to the detriment of work, technique and quality end up once again, mostly and mistakenly, extending the red carpet to the foreign market.
A closer review of the number of entrepreneurs, small and large, that the last few years have created in the sports betting area, clearly demonstrates how we generate brands, direct and indirect jobs, produce income and fortunes, and spread the activity throughout the national territory, but with this rate added to what is proposed in documents, we may have, in the medium term, five major international players swallowing the others and fighting each other.
The profession and/or affiliation activity, as well as white labeling, should, at the very least, be considered and detailed in the presentation of the draft, mainly for the Federal Revenue to understand what the proceeds from authorized operators to people are all about for physical or legal entities that provide this specific service, even because such contracts have peculiarities in the remuneration that are not similar to conventional and advertising models.
Ownership and responsibility for the portfolio of gambling customers, as well as policies regarding gambling, could also be drafted, and at that moment the role of the churches present in all municipalities becomes protagonist to act, in partnership with sports betting brands, as a social agent or professional entity prepared to welcome gamblers identified with characteristics of addiction. The decree could require the operating company to publicize the contacts and addresses of these institutions on its website and formal media, whenever and wherever the site has ongoing commercial activity, and that actively targets bettors that the tracking software detects missing the standard or going out of imposed or self-imposed limits.
Discussing payment processors is crucial to prevent money laundering and cover up tax crimes, given that a fintech nowadays opens and closes like changing a shirt. They were and are important instruments to democratize and make credit cheaper in the market, among other achievements, but with regard to payment gateways and the weight that this technological and financial provision will have in the entire universe of gaming, mainly to demonstrate security and pacify suspicions about the betting conglomerate, including evangelicals who baselessly cry out about money laundering, responsibility should be placed only on authorized banks with clear anti-money laundering policies and compliance with the current GDPR, at least in the beginning of this long process of maturation of the sector.
If applied to the churches of our blessed Federation the same laws, rules and auditing and control technologies for fixed-quota lottery admitted in most countries correctly regulated, we would have infinitely more brands of sports betting than religious temples in activity.
It is worth mentioning that all over the world it is much easier to feed organized crime or launder money with colloquial activities such as a restaurant, tourism agency, event company, rental, marketing and advertising, courses and lectures, than working in gambling, which undeniably has a complex inspection and auditing burden much greater than any conventional business.
When watching mafia movies or series, even fictional ones, pay attention to the decade in which it passes, because today organized crime in real life only operates with gambling where it is not legal and not properly regulated.
The institutional deficiencies to deal with the gaming ecosystem triggered by the plot of the sports betting decree blatantly demonstrate that the best thing for the nation is not to subordinate one more portfolio in the Economy, much less to empower a single pen linked to political positions to sign authorizations and related regulations.
The most intelligent, productive and compatible solution for the Brazilian scenario would be an independent Regulatory Agency, composed of technicians and specialists, along the lines of the American Nevada Commission, which could also internally constitute a Gaming Commission formed by representatives of the Ministry of Justice, Economy, Science and Technology, Citizenship and Sports, to act jointly and specialized in the different fronts of management, study, destination and inspection that the portfolio will constantly be demanded.
Brazil is experiencing an illustrious moment, both in the face of its own history in gambling, and in the face of the world scenario, being the ball of the moment, the jackpot that everyone wants, the all in of the regulated markets, but after resounding vexations such as that of Lotex and almost four years without inexplicably regulating fixed-odds betting, we are publicly demonstrating incapacity, insecurity and a sluggishness incompatible with the dynamism and speed of the electronic betting trade. Similarly, in a World Cup year, either we change the Economy, which is a repackaged technician who does not generate results, for an independent and much more capable and faster Technical Commission, or we will run the risk of taking a heavy defeat at home.
Conrado Caiado
Marketologist with experience in the Gambling market and representative of the GDA Consortium
Source: Diário de Pernambuco
