Will a recent ban on influencer advertising be of benefit to the country’s massive swarm of black market gambling sites? BetMGM’s head of legal Eduardo Ludmer thinks that is exactly what lawmakers’ efforts to reign in a form of advertising, that is allegedly fraught with fraud, will promote. It’s a sticky situation that illustrates some of the many growing pains the country’s recently regulated and legalized gaming market is facing.
The controversy surrounding influencer advertising was set off earlier this year when a parliamentary inquiry commission (CPI) issued a report on the impacts of regulated gambling started taking a closer look at the issue. That report included a recommendation to ban influencer advertising entirely. That report was also the first CPI report in the last ten years to have its report rejected by the Brazilian Senate. Nonetheless, the Brazilian Senate embraced the report’s influencer recommendations and suggested that they be codified into law.
Ludmer strongly disagreed with that sentiment in a statement reported on by iGamingBusiness.com saying, “Imposing excessive restrictions on influencers who work with legal operators may inadvertently empower precisely the very market we aim to suppress: the illegal sector, which operates without accountability, disregards player welfare and undermines the integrity and reputation of the industry as a whole.”
He went on to suggest that influencer advertising actually promotes traffic to regulated gaming sites, since many Brazilians have found differentiating between black market and legitimate sites to be difficult.
For the time being, influencer ads are still legal in Brazil, but that situation could change at any time.