The Secretariat of Prizes and Betting (SPA) of the Ministry of Finance has defined some criteria for what may be subject to sanctions:
- operating the fixed-odds lottery without prior authorization from the Ministry's Prizes and Betting Department;
- carrying out prohibited, unauthorized operations or activities or activities that are not in accordance with the authorization granted;
- obstructing the SPA's inspection;
- failing to provide the SPA with mandatory documents, data or information;
- publishing advertising or commercial propaganda for fixed-odds lottery operators not authorized by the Ministry of Finance;
- carrying out, encouraging, allowing or, in any way, contributing to practices that undermine sports integrity, the uncertainty of sports results, the transparency of rules, equality among competitors and any other form of fraud or undue interference capable of affecting the fairness or soundness of conduct associated with the proper performance of the sports activity;
- failing to comply with legal and regulatory standards whose compliance is the responsibility of the Ministry of Finance to monitor.
The administrative sanctioning process will be initiated, instructed and analyzed by the SPA's Monitoring and Inspection Sub-Secretariat and, after analysis, will be forwarded to the agency's Sanctioning Action Sub-Secretariat for a decision.
All communication between the SPA and the operator must be carried out, preferably, in the Electronic Information System - SEI or another system that replaces it, or by request in the general protocol of the Ministry of Finance Headquarters Building, in Brasília.
The deadline stipulated by the SPA for the performance of the procedural act by the interested party will be ten days, unless otherwise provided by law, and if it falls on weekends or holidays, it will be extended to the next business day.
The defense on the part of the operator must be presented by the interested party or by an attorney appointed by him, within thirty days after being notified.
SPA/MF Ordinance No. 1,233 establishes the penalties and states that they will not cease to be applied even if the operator corrects the irregularity or claims ignorance or misunderstanding of the rules established by the SPA or another public body.
After the analysis is complete and if irregularities are found, the SPA defined the following sanctions:
- warning;
- a fine of 0.1% to 20% for legal entities on the amount collected in the last fiscal year before the initiation of the proceedings. The amount of the fine will not exceed R$2 billion per violation;
- in the case of other entities for which the above criterion cannot be used, the Treasury has defined a fine that will be between R$50 thousand and R$1 billion per violation;
- partial or total suspension of the exercise of activities, for a period of up to one hundred and eighty days;
- cancellation of the authorization, in addition to – depending on the case – prohibiting the issuance of new accreditation for a maximum of ten years;
- prohibition of carrying out certain activities or types of operation, for a maximum period of ten years;
- prohibition of participating in bidding processes for the concession or permission of public services, in the federal public administration, direct or indirect, for a period of no less than five years;
- disqualification from acting as a director or administrator of companies whose bylaws in any way explore any type of lottery, for a maximum period of twenty years.
Source: GMB
