Lottery officials said 75 percent of the 292.2 million number combinations were purchased ahead of Saturday’s drawing.
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“When the jackpots get big like this, it creates a frenzy”, said Brian Johnson, vice president of finance at Casey’s General Stores, which runs 1,900 stores in 14 states.
The largest jackpot in USA history shot up to $1.5 billion on Tuesday, driven by record sales as people flock across state lines and worldwide borders to buy tickets, a lottery executive said.
Many Iowa Lottery signs that display jackpot amounts for both Powerball and Mega Millions are set to display amounts in millions – not billions.
Saturday’s winning numbers were 16-19-32-34-57-13.
Most recently, there was one $1 million Match 5 victor in Boston.
The tickets were sold at a Pilot Travel Center in Dexter, a Speedway gas station in Holland and a Meijer store in Rochester Hills, WDIV reported.
In this case, that’s a $930 million cash value.
It was already the single largest lottery prize ever, and the hype has sent ticket sales skyrocketing – driving the grand prize higher still. Officials with the Multi-State Lottery Association, a group of state lotteries that oversee Powerball, said this is one of the most frequent complaints.
The Powerball lottery draw is on Wednesday. Well, with Powerball you have to pick numbers from 1 through 69. After that, if no one wins during the bi-weekly drawings, the sum increases proportionately to ticket sales.
The tickets cost $2 each, and can be randomly generated or filled out with your own choices, like your favorite kids’ birthdays.
The Powerball format changed in October 2015, and its new rules are precisely why we’re in $1.5 billion territory right now. Plus, most states would take a chunk – something winners in Florida, South Dakota, Texas, Washington and Wyoming wouldn’t have to worry about because those states have no income tax.
In other Lottery news, here are a few stories on MLive.
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Even for a Monday afternoon, more people were coming in than usual, but it still wasn’t as many as she expects to come in to buy the $2 tickets on Wednesday night.
