A check conducted by Estadão in partnership with Projeto Comprova found that the information claiming that bets on Mega-Sena had dropped in 2024 due to the growth of online betting in Brazil is false. A post published on X stated that the federal government is "in despair" over the results of the country's most important lottery. According to Caixa, there was a positive variation of 22% from January to August this year.
The content investigated was a publication on X claiming that the federal government is "in despair", because "people have stopped playing Mega-Sena and are giving all their money to online betting".
Estadão and Comprova, a collaborative and non-profit initiative led and maintained by the Brazilian Association of Investigative Journalism, went after the data and proved the falsity of the publication.
In conclusion, Comprova attests: "It is not true that Brazilians are stopping betting on Mega-Sena, the main lottery of Caixa Econômica Federal, to put their money into online betting – contrary to what the publication on X says. Contacted by Comprova, the institution denied any decrease in the number of games".
"Bets on Mega-Sena showed a positive variation of 22% from January to August 2024, compared to the same period in 2023", stated the institution, which does not report the absolute number of bets.
This positive variation means that, contrary to what the investigated publication claims, the bets have increased so far. According to Caixa, this growth is related to the value of the prizes, the quantity, and the collection. Bets can be made at lottery outlets and on the bank's digital platforms.
On the institution's website, it was possible to verify that from January to August this year, the collection from Mega-Sena was R$ 6,076,232,420. In the same period of 2023, the amount was R$ 5,315,120,448, considering inflation.
Another data that contradicts the idea of a decrease in the number of bettors was from Mega da Virada: in 2023, it recorded more than 485.25 million bets, compared to about 435.21 million the previous year.
Although the post misinforms by talking about a drop in Mega-Sena, it is correct in suggesting that online betting, or bets, are increasing. The sector grew 734.6% between 2021 and April this year, according to research from the data analysis platform Datahub, published by CNN.
However, the claim that bets would be competitors of Mega-Sena has already been refuted by the CEO of CAIXA Loterias, Lucíola Vasconcelos. In August, she said: "[Lotteries and bets] are not competitive markets. We have started to operate in a new market of games and bets. Speaking of strategy, we know it is a very large market and regulation will bring more formality to the market".
Reach of the publication
Comprova investigates the most widely reached suspicious content on social networks. Until August 27, before the suspension of X, the publication had 3,7 thousand views.
The sources consulted by Estadão and Comprova were Caixa Econômica Federal, through its communication advisory, data available on the official portal of the institution, and articles from CNN and UOL on the subject.
Source: Estadão
