Brazil’s Supreme Federal Court has taken another significant step in one of the country’s most consequential gambling jurisdiction battles, authorising Caixa Econômica Federal to formally join the case that will determine whether municipalities have the right to operate their own lotteries.
Justice Kassio Nunes Marques, the rapporteur of ADPF 1212, granted Caixa’s request to participate as amicus curiae in the constitutional action. The decision means Brazil’s largest state-owned financial institution — and the sole operator of federal lotteries since 1961 — now has an official seat in proceedings that could fundamentally reshape who gets to run lottery and betting operations across the country.
The case itself was filed by the Solidariedade political party and challenges the constitutionality of municipal laws across 13 Brazilian cities that had established their own lottery and betting systems. The municipalities in question span seven states, with challenged legislation covering cities including São Paulo, Campinas, Guarulhos, Belo Horizonte, Foz do Iguaçu, Porto Alegre and others. The central legal question is whether the federal constitution’s grant of exclusive legislative authority over lottery systems to the Union extends to municipalities, or whether local governments can carve out their own regulatory space as some states have done.
The case has been building momentum for over a year. In December 2025, Justice Nunes Marques issued a sweeping preliminary injunction suspending all municipal laws and decrees authorising lottery and sports betting operations nationwide. That order covered more than 5,500 municipalities and halted both ongoing operations and active bidding processes. Non-compliance carries heavy financial consequences — municipalities continuing lottery operations face fines of R$500,000 per day, while mayors and company heads face personal fines of R$50,000 daily. Some cities have already moved to repeal their local lottery laws in response, with Cuiabá among those formally revoking its enabling legislation.
The Attorney General’s Office has aligned firmly with the federal position, arguing that municipalities are constitutionally prohibited from operating lottery services — a competence reserved to the Union and, through precedent, to states and the Federal District. The AGU warned of the risks of fragmented regulation, noting that decentralised control over lottery and betting activities would undermine standardisation across consumer protection, advertising and public health safeguards. Over 80 municipalities had issued regulations creating their own lotteries in the three years prior to the STF’s intervention, with roughly 55 doing so in 2025 alone following the initial lawsuit — a trend the AGU described as a disorderly proliferation of unregulated gambling activity.
Caixa’s entry into the case as amicus curiae is significant precisely because of its institutional weight. As the operator of Brazil’s federal lottery system under a mandate dating back to 1961, Caixa has a direct commercial and regulatory stake in the outcome. Its participation will allow it to submit written statements, technical information and, potentially, oral arguments as the case moves toward a final judgment. The full STF has not yet set a date for the final ruling, meaning the December 2025 suspension remains in full effect as the only operative framework governing municipal lottery activities.
For the iGaming industry, the stakes of ADPF 1212 extend well beyond the lottery sector in its narrow sense. The case is testing the boundaries of Brazil’s federal structure as applied to gambling regulation — and the final ruling will establish whether the country’s gaming framework remains centralised around federal and state authority, or whether a new tier of local operators could eventually enter the market. With Caixa now formally in the room, the federal government’s position has gained both institutional credibility and technical depth heading into what is shaping up to be a landmark constitutional decision.
