A lucky California ticket holder won the second-highest Powerball jackpot ever at $1.73 billion on Wednesday night.
The winning numbers were: 22, 24, 40, 52, 64 and the Powerball 10.
The single ticket was sold at Midway Market & Liquor in Frazier Park, the California Lottery announced last night.
The massive win ends a long period without a grand prize winner, resulting in twelve weeks of rollovers.
The whopping jackpot is the second-largest lottery prize in the world, beaten only by the $2.04 billion Powerball prize that Edwin Castro won in California last November.
The winning numbers were: 22, 24, 40, 52, 64 and the Powerball 10
The single ticket was sold at Midway Market & Liquor in Frazier Park, the California Lottery announced last night
Castro – who opted to take a lump sum of $997.6 million – has since purchased a $47 million Los Angeles complex sold by famed real estate agent Mauricio Umansky, along with three separate California mansions for a total of $76 million.
The enormous LA property has seven bedrooms and eleven bathrooms, a koi pond and a huge infinity pool with views over the city.
He was also seen driving away from a bank in a vintage Porsche.
Before Wednesday’s drawing, another player from California matched all six numbers to earn $1.08 billion July 19.
If Wednesday’s winner chooses to accept his prize as a lump sum, he will be punished more than anyone in the past two decades.
When someone wins the lottery, they usually have two options to claim their prize money.
They either accept a lump sum, which is paid to them immediately, or they claim the full jackpot amount, which is paid to them in annuities over the next thirty years.
If the winner of Wednesday’s Powerball chooses a $1.73 billion lump sum, as nearly 98 percent of winners have done in the past, they will immediately receive about $757 million.
On January 21, the winner of the $730 million jackpot cashed out a whopping $550 million. The lump sum was therefore 75 percent of the advertised jackpot
The advertised jackpot is therefore the amount you would receive if the prize pool were invested in a portfolio of government bonds for 30 years.
On Wednesday, only 44 percent of the advertised $1.73 billion jackpot will be available as a lump sum. That is the lowest since 2003
That may be a lot of money, but as a percentage of the advertised jackpot amount it is the lowest since 2003, at just 44 percent.
Powerballs terrible odds of 1 in 292.2 million are designed to generate large jackpots, with the prizes getting bigger and bigger as they roll over repeatedly if no one wins. And wins in recent months have been few and far between.
That didn’t bother those eager to put their money down Wednesday for a chance at instant wealth.
Robert Salvato Jr., a 60-year-old electrician, bought 40 Powerball tickets at a hardware store in Billerica, Massachusetts.
“I would take care of the family and give my cat that extra leg she needs and make her a good cat,” said Salvato, who got married Saturday.
“I could give her a ring on each finger, I guess,” Salvato said of his new wife.
Nevada is one of five states without Powerball, so friends Tamara Carter and Denise Davis drove from Las Vegas across the state line to California to buy tickets. But at the first stop the line was so long that they gave up and looked for another store.
“The line was about three hours long,” Carter estimated. “I waited maybe half an hour, but it didn’t move.”
The jackpot has grown enormously due to a long dry period. The previous winning Powerball ticket was sold on July 19 and was worth $1.08 billion after 39 drawings without a jackpot win.
At the same hardware store as Salvato, Kevin Button seemed to understand the long odds when he bought a ticket.
“I usually only buy them when the jackpot is high,” Button said. “It seems to have been quite high a lot lately. So I’ve tried it a few times and haven’t even won a free ticket. But maybe tonight is the night.”
In most states, a Powerball ticket costs $2 and players can select their own numbers or leave that task to a computer.
The $1.73 billion jackpot is for one winner who chooses to pay through an annuity, published over 30 years. Winners almost always choose the cash option.
Winnings would be subject to federal taxes, and many states also tax lottery winnings.
Powerball is played in 45 states, as well as Washington, DC, Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands.
