Cibelae puts prediction markets on its 2027 agenda
Among the priorities set by the Corporación Iberoamericana de Loterías y Apuestas de Estado for 2027, there is one that looks toward a competitor that does not yet have a regulatory name in the region. Cibelae announced that it will study emerging wagering formats, including prediction markets—a segment that offers contracts on future outcomes without presenting itself as gambling, and which therefore currently falls outside the perimeter monitored by state lotteries and their regulators.
The other two pillars for the coming year are more inward-looking. The organization aims to build a proprietary AI-powered tool to assist and issue alerts for member lotteries, and it will seek to identify regional laboratories and consulting firms capable of supporting the implementation of both its own standards and those set by the World Lottery Association. That second objective says something about the present state of affairs: if the stated goal is to reduce cost, time, distance, and language barriers, then the current certification pipeline remains expensive, slow, and distant for a portion of its members.
The anniversary figures explain why the organization can set such an agenda. Founded in 1988 and now marking 38 years, Cibelae reports a presence across 22 countries, 27 lotteries and operators among its members, and a corporate registry exceeding 60 companies, following 35 percent growth over the last two years. The headline figure in its communications is another: 87 percent of the lottery market, although the geographical scope of that percentage appears as Ibero-American in one part of the material and as Latin American in another, with no published methodology to substantiate it. With 27 operators across 22 countries, the figure reflects institutional coverage rather than a market measurement.
The balance sheet's most honest indicator is compliance. Cibelae launched its Anti-Money Laundering Technical Standard in 2024 and places 40 percent of its regular members at Level 1, with Level 2 still ahead. Read in reverse, two years after the launch, six out of ten regular members have not yet reached the first tier, placing the standard in an early rather than consolidated stage of adoption.
The structure driving this agenda comprises six technical commissions—spanning technology, processes, products, legal affairs, anti-money laundering, and the area combining corporate social responsibility with responsible gambling—involving more than 90 professionals from member institutions. In responsible gambling, it adopts the WLA certification framework as a benchmark and, through an agreement with digitalRG, provides members with digital tools to manage and monitor those processes. On the illegal gambling front, it produces studies and coordinates inter-institutional actions, and for the past six years has published surveys based on data from its regular members, including the Gaming Map (Mapa de Juegos), which tracks the evolution of each lottery product and the market in which it is sold, and the Illegal Market Report (Informe sobre el Mercado Ilegal), which attempts to measure the volume of wagers taking place outside the regulated system. Its Loterías en Acción platform brings together members' social impact initiatives.
In-person activity over the last two years sketches the map of its interests: marketing seminars in Buenos Aires, an Asunción meeting dedicated to lottery products and sports betting, and working sessions in San José, Costa Rica, focused on security and illegal gambling. The anniversary address to members was delivered by Javier Milián, president of Cibelae and of the Lotería Nacional de Beneficencia de El Salvador.
Cibelae is the association bringing together Ibero-American state lotteries and betting operators, founded in 1988 to coordinate technical cooperation among public gaming operators. It develops standards in anti-money laundering, responsible gambling, and technology, and maintains an institutional relationship with the World Lottery Association, the global body of the lottery sector whose responsible gambling certification framework has been adopted by many of its members.
Tags: Cibelae, lotteries, prediction markets, WLA