US Powerball jackpot hits $1 billion

UNITED STATES (Reuters): The U.S. Powerball jackpot has reached a whopping $1 billion for only the third time in the game’s history after another Monday night drawing produced no winning ticket.

The Monday drawing was the 38th in a row without someone winning the top prize, which increases every time the jackpot goes unclaimed. To win big, a ticket holder has to match all six numbers drawn.

The odds of winning the jackpot are one in 292.2 million, according to the Powerball website.

Jackpot winners can collect their prize in either one lump-sum payment or as an annual disbursement made in 30 graduated payments over 29 years.

The last winning jackpot ticket was picked on April 19, for a grand prize of $252.6 million. Jackpot drawings are held every Monday, Wednesday and Saturday.

While the jackpot remains up for grabs, Monday night’s drawing did yield three tickets worth $2 million each, sold in Arkansas, Georgia and Texas.

Another five tickets worth $1 million were claimed in Connecticut, Florida, Kentucky, New York and Pennsylvania.

At a New York City 7-Eleven store near Times Square on Tuesday, David Shanosky took a quick break to buy a bundle of tickets for his office’s lottery pool.

“We dream big,” said Shanosky, a vice president at RLI Insurance Group. “We love to dream.”

Asked what he would do with a billion dollars, Shanosky said wryly that he would not be going back to work.

“But I honestly try not to think about it, so I don’t get too disappointed when I don’t win,” he said.

The largest Powerball jackpot ever won was in November, when a California man drew the lucky numbers for $2.04 billion.

Before that, the record was $1.59 billion, won in 2016.

Powerball is played in 45 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands.