Peru Consults on Online Betting Rule Changes With Lower Fine Caps and Stricter Ad Warnings

Peru's tourism and trade ministry has published draft amendments to the regulations behind its licensed online gambling market, with 15 days for comment. It would spell out detailed advertising rules, but also cut the maximum fine for the most serious breaches from 200 to 70 tax units.

• Peru's Ministry of Foreign Trade and Tourism (MINCETUR) has published a draft supreme decree amending the regulations of Law 31557, the online gaming and sports betting law amended by Law 31806, under a ministerial resolution published in the official gazette El Peruano on 21 October
• Comments are open for 15 calendar days from the day after publication, which runs to 5 November, and any public or private body, civil society organisation or individual may send them
• Every gambling advert would carry a fixed addiction warning, shown for at least five seconds on screen or over 10% of a printed advert, and operators would answer for their influencers
• It would also lower the fine ranges, with the top fine for a very serious breach falling from 200 to 70 tax units (UIT), and cap fines at 10% of the offender's previous-year gross income, a cap that does not apply to repeat offenders or unlicensed operators
• It arrives as MINCETUR hosts the world's gambling regulators in Lima and as a bill to raise the selective tax on online bets from 1% to 5% sits in Congress

Peru Opens a 15-Day Window on Changes to Its Online Gambling Rulebook

MINCETUR published the draft and its explanatory memorandum on gob.pe under Ministerial Resolution 382-2026-MINCETUR, dated 20 October, signed by Minister Rogers Valencia Espinoza and listed in El Peruano on 21 October. It gives 15 calendar days for comments from public and private entities, civil society organisations and interested individuals, filed through the ministry's portal, at its Lima offices or by email to apuestasdeportivas@mincetur.gob.pe. The General Directorate of Casino Games and Slot Machines (DGJCMT) will analyse them.

The decree would amend Supreme Decree 005-2023-MINCETUR, the regulations behind the licensed market that opened in February 2024. The memorandum, signed by DGJCMT director general Yuri Guerra Padilla on 8 June, calls the changes technical adjustments drawn from the first year of supervision, identified with industry associations and the Ministry of Economy and Finance. Some were requested by the operators' association APADELA in March 2024. It counts 4,559 authorised sports betting halls.

Advertising Gets Its Own Rulebook

A new Article 56 would let adverts promote only MINCETUR-authorised platforms and games, naming the licensee and its authorisation number. They could not target minors, present betting as income or a solution to money problems, or link it to social success. Promoting unauthorised platforms would be banned in any medium.

Every advert would carry, unabbreviated, the warning that remote games and bets played to excess can cause gambling addiction: for at least five seconds on screen or in audio, and over at least 10% of a print or outdoor advert. Influencer posts would have to be labelled as advertising, avoid audiences made up mainly of minors and show the warning. The licensee would answer for adverts placed by third parties, influencers included.

Guerra told SBC Noticias at the IAGR conference this week that some licensed operators were making "excessive and intrusive" use of the media and that warnings could be too small or brief to notice, according to iGamingToday. Limits on advertising times are not planned for now but could follow, he said.

Payments, Data, Suppliers and Fines

Operators would have to pay out player balances within three working days of a request, by bank or in cash, and check that each user uses a single payment method per transaction. Data sent to MINCETUR would use one exchange-rate rule, at the finance ministry's request, and server access would be given within 10 working days of a request rather than routinely.

Licence conditions tighten. Operators could not trade without their guarantee, renewed each February. Betting halls could run only one platform and no online casino games. Suppliers would disclose on request every brand they serve worldwide, and live casino suppliers their studio locations; serving an unlicensed platform would cost a supplier its registration for at least a year. MINCETUR would gain an express power to confiscate equipment used in unauthorised gambling.

Sanctions change most. Minor breaches would carry a warning or 1 to 11 UIT, serious ones 1 to 35 UIT and very serious ones up to 70 UIT, cancellation or disqualification, against up to 50, 50 to 150 and 150 to 200 UIT now. At the 2026 UIT of S/5,500, the top fine falls from S/1.1 million, approximately $319,000, to S/385,000, approximately $112,000. Fines would be capped at 10% of the previous year's gross income, except for repeat offences and unlicensed operation, and would weigh illicit gain, probability of detection, harm, intent and ability to pay.

Lower Ceilings Are a Bet on Fines That Stick

The memorandum says the new ranges suit the sector, deterring without being excessive. That is defensible in principle, since a ceiling deters only if it is credible. But 70 UIT is modest against a national operator's revenue, and the floor for a serious breach drops from above 50 UIT to 1 UIT. The draft is also exempt from a regulatory impact analysis on the ground that it adds no substantive obligations, which is hard to square with its new advertising duties. Lower fines will be justified only if MINCETUR imposes them often.

The Advertising Rules Are Precise, the Enforcer Is Someone Else

The draft names the consumer authority INDECOPI as the enforcer of advertising rules, leaving MINCETUR the warnings in betting halls and on operators' home pages. Five seconds and 10% are easy to measure on television; influencer content is not, which is why licensee liability matters most. Spain has gone further, consulting on banning celebrity and influencer gambling ads. Peru regulates rather than bans, keeping time limits in reserve.

Channelisation Runs Through Both Halves

The advertising ban on unlicensed sites, the supplier revocations and the confiscation power all target the offshore market MINCETUR says it has been shrinking, after the 40% drop in illegal supply it reported in 2025. The proposed fivefold rise in the stake tax pulls the other way, and no rulebook offsets that if it passes.

The draft makes Peru's advertising rules specific enough to enforce and its fines small enough to impose. Whether the market stays licensed will depend at least as much on Congress and the tax bill as on anything filed by 5 November.