Key Points
- Codere Online got itself a multi-year NFL betting partnership deal, involving Super Bowl LXI and the 22 November 2026 match in Mexico City, at Estadio Banorte.
- Mexico brought in €36.1 million in NGR for Codere Online in Q2 2026, up 24% year on year, and is the largest market for the company.
- IEPS rate in Mexico gaming was increased to 50% in 2026 from 30%, and its core regulation is the federal legislation dating back to 1947.
Codere Online Signs NFL Deal in Mexico, But the Regulatory Clock Is Still Ticking
Codere Online timed its latest statement on Mexico to the beginning of the NFL season. In its September 10, 2026, announcement, Codere Online signed a multi-year partnership deal with the National Football League, making it the NFL’s official sports betting partner in Mexico. This agreement comes in light of the company having posted its best financial results for one quarter, which happened a little more than six weeks ago, and the return of the NFL to Mexico City for a regular-season match, just a few weeks away.
Carlos Sabanza, Director of Sponsorships and Public Relations for Codere Online, highlighted the long-term perspective of this move: “This agreement enhances our premium positioning, reinforcing our long-term commitment to Mexico, a market with an extraordinary passion for the NFL.”
What the Agreement Actually Covers?
This agreement involves more than just one year and joins Codere Online with the most prominent NFL brands in Mexico. Codere Online becomes the official betting partner of the NFL in Mexico, the official partner of Super Bowl LXI and the official sports betting sponsor of the NFL Mexico City Game that will be held on 22 November 2026 featuring the match between the San Francisco 49ers and the Minnesota Vikings at Estadio Banorte stadium, formerly known as Estadio Azteca.
Beyond event rights, the partnership includes hospitality programmes, VIP experiences, activations across several Mexican cities, and access to official NFL merchandise for Codere Online customers.
Arturo Olivé, Managing Director of NFL Mexico, confirmed the significance of the market on the league’s side: “Mexico is one of the NFL’s most vibrant and important international markets, with millions of passionate fans engaging with our game year-round. We are pleased to welcome Codere Online, one of Mexico’s most established and recognised online gaming and sports betting operators, as a partner.”
Why Mexico Matters This Much to Codere Online?
Mexico is not only the biggest single market for Codere Online; it is also its main source of growth. Codere Online reported NGR of €36.1 million for Mexico in Q2 2026, which was an increase of 24% YoY and easily eclipsed Spain’s €27.6 million. In the first six months of 2026, Mexican NGR amounted to €70.6 million, showing growth of 19% YoY. This resulted in the company’s record Q2 NGR of €69.4 million and led to increased guidance for the year, ranging from €255 million to €265 million.
The World Cup was one accelerant; the 2026 tournament saw unique users up 56% from 2022 and nearly 40,000 new customers acquired. But the structural growth in Mexico, not just the tournament, is the foundation the NFL deal is built on. CEO Aviv Sher, reflecting on Q2 in the post-earnings call, was straightforward about where the company’s priorities sit: “When we talk about investing our next dollar in Mexico and Spain, it’s because we believe those markets offer the best risk-adjusted returns for us right now.”
It is also worth noting the separate commercial activity happening around the same market at the same time. One day after Codere Online’s league-wide announcement, the Las Vegas Raiders confirmed their own team-level sports betting partnership with Mexican sportsbook Team México. The NFL’s Global Markets Program grants individual franchises their own marketing rights in designated countries, which means 10 NFL teams currently hold such rights in Mexico, operating independently from the league-wide commercial deals that operators like Codere Online secure separately.
Signing Big While the Tax Clock Ticks
This is the part most coverage of this deal passes over. Codere Online is making a multi-year, high-visibility commitment to Mexico at the same moment its cost structure there has worsened considerably. Mexico raised its gaming IEPS rate from 30% to 50% in 2026, without amending the underlying regulatory law. That is a 20-percentage-point increase on gross gaming revenue, and it did not arrive quietly.
The regulatory law itself dates to 1947. Sher has been direct about what that means in practice: “Right now we are working based on a framework of laws which you cannot even call regulation, from 1947. So it’s very hard to work long-term and to give long-term commitments.” He has also said Codere Online can mitigate most of the tax increase, but has been careful not to call it resolved. The competitive pressure is building simultaneously. His own Q2 commentary acknowledged it plainly: “We cannot ignore the competitive environment. It is getting crowded and they are heavy spenders over there.”
A Strategy Built Around Localisation
The NFL deal is not an isolated bet. It slots into a deliberate, years-long pattern of pairing Codere Online’s brand with high-recognition sports properties in Mexico. The company became the official betting partner of Monterrey Rayados, the men’s Liga MX side, and became the main sponsor of Rayadas, the club’s women’s team, in July 2025. The wider Codere Group holds a separate sponsorship with Real Madrid, which Codere Online uses across LatAm as a broader brand asset.
Sher has described the approach as “taking the local hero approach,” building brand market by market rather than pushing a single global identity. The NFL deal is the largest version of that strategy yet: a global sports brand with deep local resonance in Mexico, now commercially linked to one of the country’s leading online betting operators.
Expert Analysis
We think there is a tension in this deal that deserves more attention than it has received, and it is not the tax rate.
Codere Online is locking itself into multi-year NFL commitments in a market where its own CEO has said long-term planning is structurally difficult. That is not a contradiction; companies operate under regulatory uncertainty all the time. But it does raise a genuine question about sequencing. Codere is acquiring obligations tied to Super Bowl LXI and the 2027 Los Angeles game, to activations across Mexican cities, to VIP programmes and merchandise rights, all of which carry brand and reputational exposure that extends years into the future. If Mexico’s regulatory picture shifts sharply, those obligations do not dissolve.
What strikes us as underreported is the commercial architecture question. Two separate betting operators now hold overlapping NFL rights in the same country at the same time: Codere Online at the league level and Team México at the franchise level. The NFL’s Global Markets Program was designed to permit exactly this arrangement, but whether it creates clarity or noise for Mexican bettors watching both operators run campaigns around the same 22 November game remains an open question. We are not suggesting it is a problem yet, only that nobody has asked it publicly, and that seems like an oversight worth naming.
Codere Online’s financial position has improved materially, with record NGR, positive H1 net income, and no financial debt reported at the close of Q2 2026. The NFL deal reflects that. The risk is not that the strategy is wrong; it may well prove exactly right. The risk is that the regulatory and competitive pressures Sher himself describes could narrow the flexibility this kind of deal demands.
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