Powerball Has a $754M Winner

Ticket was sold in Seattle suburb
By Newser Editors and Wire Services
Posted Feb 7, 2023 12:00 PM CST
One Ticket Hits $754M Prize
A display panel advertises tickets for a Powerball drawing at a convenience store in Renfrew, Pa., last fall.   (AP Photo/Keith Srakocic, File)

A single winning ticket for a $754.6 million Powerball jackpot was sold at a department store in a Seattle suburb, Washington state lottery officials said Tuesday. The winning numbers drawn Monday night were 5,11, 22, 23, 69, and the Powerball 7. The winning ticket was bought Sunday at a Fred Meyer store in Auburn, about 30 miles south of Seattle, lottery officials said. The store will receive a $50,000 bonus. The winner has not yet come forward, the AP reports. It's the second time a Powerball jackpot ticket was sold in Washington state, and both tickets were purchased in Auburn. The first was a $90 million jackpot in 2014.

Lottery officials said another $1 million prize from a ticket bought in Airway Heights, near Spokane, in November remains unclaimed. Lottery winners have 180 days to claim their prizes. Powerball officials said in a statement early Tuesday that a single ticket matched all six numbers and that ticket sales pushed the jackpot higher than an earlier $747 million estimate. The full jackpot is for a winner opting for an annuity distributed in one immediate but partial payout followed by additional payments over 29 years that increase by 5% annually. The winner also can opt for a one-time cash payment of $407.2 million. Both prizes available are the amounts before taxes, Powerball said.

The estimated jackpot for the next drawing scheduled for Wednesday is $20 million, according to the lottery's website. Monday night's win was the first Powerball jackpot win since Nov. 19. That winless streak allowed the prize to grow larger and larger until it became the ninth-biggest in US history. Higher interest rates have allowed annuity payments to increase compared with earlier jackpots, when rates were lower. Most winners prefer the immediate cash prize. The game's abysmal odds of 1 in 292.2 million are designed to build big prizes that draw more players. That strategy has worked recently.

(More Powerball stories.)

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