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After 40 drawings with no grand-prize winner, the Powerball jackpot ballooned to $699.8 million for Monday night’s drawing, with one lucky person winning the prize, one of the largest ever in U.S. lottery history.
Monday’s winning numbers were 12, 22, 54, 66, 69 and Powerball 15. One person won the jackpot, according to Powerball. California Lottery said the winner was from Morro Bay, Calif., a coastal city of about 10,000 people with a median income of about $68,000.
The winner will be able to choose between an annuity option paid over 29 years or a cash option of $496 million. Both are subject to taxes.
The identity of the winner was not immediately announced, but per California law, the winner’s name, as well as the location where the winning ticket was sold, is required to be made public, according to California Lottery.
“A jackpot of this magnitude doesn’t happen very often, and when it does, we see an influx of new players to the game, which drives the jackpot even higher,” May Scheve Reardon, chair of Powerball Product Group and executive director of the Missouri Lottery, said in a statement before Monday’s drawing. “Players should check their tickets closely, because even though they didn’t win the jackpot, they may have won a lower-tier prize.”
The winning numbers Saturday were 28, 38, 42, 47, 52 and Powerball 1. While there was no grand-prize winner, more than 2.8 million tickets netted prizes ranging from $4 to $1 million. One ticket sold in Massachusetts matched all five white balls; 66 others matched four white balls and the Powerball to win $50,000. Saturday’s grand prize of $635 million would have been the 10th-largest U.S. lottery jackpot, the Associated Press reported.
Before Monday’s drawing, the Powerball jackpot was most recently hit June 5, when someone in Florida purchased a ticket worth $285.6 million. The 40 subsequent drawings without a grand-prize winner mark a record streak for the game, lottery officials said.
Since Aug. 23, Powerball has been offering a third weekly drawing to increase jackpots more quickly. Tickets are sold for $2 per play in 45 states, along with D.C., Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands. Drawings are broadcast live at 10:59 p.m. Eastern time every Monday, Wednesday and Saturday.
Prizes in eye-popping amounts often draw a rush of “jackpot chasers” — infrequent players who snatch up tickets on a whim, figuring, “Why not?” The amount then balloons. It’s all by design, with monster jackpots generating major public interest and drawing in more players.
“We had robust ticket sales through the weekend, and traditionally, we tend to see the majority of ticket purchases happen the day of a drawing,” Reardon said.
The odds of winning the Powerball jackpot are extremely low, at 292.2 million to 1.
The biggest U.S. jackpot was $1.586 billion, split among winners in California, Florida and Tennessee in 2016. On Jan. 22, someone in Michigan won the third-largest jackpot, worth $1.05 billion. Two days later, someone in Maryland won the sixth-largest, worth $731.1 million.
Bryan Pietsch contributed to this report.
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