The world’s richest lottery is Spain’s annual Christmas “El Gordo”, which in 2015 handed out 2.2 billion euros (S$3.4 billion) but which capped individual wins at 400,000 euros and handed out thousands of smaller prizes.
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Despite that, shops all over the United States did a roaring trade in frenzied last-minute ticket sales in the final hours before the live draw.
The biggest Powerball victor is actually state government in the jurisdictions that participate.
Lottery officials often note that while the jackpot gets all the attention, far more players get a nice consolation prize of $1 million for matching the five white balls but missing the Powerball.
It’s expected to be several hours before Powerball officials know if any other winning tickets were sold. The identity of the winners was not yet known.
A man buys Powerball tickets in New York, Wednesday, Jan. 13, 2016. The store will receive a $1-million bonus for selling the ticket.
None of the winners’ identities have yet been revealed.
A spokesman for the California Lottery says winning Powerball tickets have also been sold in Tennessee and Florida. The Powerball jackpot for Wednesday night’s drawing is at least $1.5 billion, the largest lottery jackpot in the world.
The winning numbers are: 8, 27, 34, 4, 19 plus Powerball 10.
Two more winning jackpot tickets were sold, one each in Florida and Tennessee, NBC News said, quoting California Lottery spokesman Russ Lopez. If a victor takes a one-time lump sum, which is generally the case, the jackpot is “only” $930 million.
The previous record lottery jackpot payout for North America was in March, 2012, when 656 million dollars was won in the Mega Millions lottery.
The Multi-State Lottery Association did not identify the winners.
The Texas Lottery reported more than $2,100 in sales per second between 5 p.m. and 6 p.m. the evening of the drawing.
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The last time the jackpot was scooped was in November a year ago. But the odds of winning are still extraordinarily slim, at 1 in 292.2 million. No one has matched all six Powerball numbers since then, so the prize kept growing. That’s why the jackpot grew so large, from an initial $40 million to $1.5 billion.
