It’s my last day in the States and off to the New York Stock Exchange to join TEDx Wall Street – the first one ever!
Staying in downtown New York is as mad as ever, but fun.
What’s really fun is the lottery fervour fever.
Everyone’s talking about the lottery called Mega Millions.
Not surprising as it’s the biggest lottery prize ever, with an estimated $540 million, which may rise to over $600 million by the time the cash registers stop beeping at 22:45 tonight, and the draw takes place at 23:00 (04:00 GMT, 31st March).
The whole of America is wrapped up in the frenzy, with over $175 million added to the cash prize since Tuesday, when the rollover failed to be won for the 18th consecutive time since January 27th.
Not surprisingly it’s sparked off a whole load of media coverage with Georgia, where the lottery will be drawn tonight in Atlanta, claiming to be the biggest suckers in America for such gambling.
About 20 million tickets have been sold in the state since Wednesday, 10 times the normal amount.
Interestingly, this week is also the first week that lottery tickets could be purchased online.
Previously, online gambling legislation meant this was not possible, but Illinois became the first state to offer online tickets this week, and sold their first ticket just three minutes after the system went live at 7:00 on Sunday.
Meantime, in a typical let’s poop the party moment, politicians came out and said that any lottery winner would no longer get welfare. Why the hell would they want welfare if they’ve just won $540 million???
Anyways, yours truly is caught up in this magical moment and here’s my ticket to Mega Millions:
Hope I win as that would buy a few American banks.
And, to put it n perspective, there is a 1 in 175 million chance of winning the American Mega Millions lottery.
You are about:
- 176 times more likely to be struck by lightning
- 3.76 times more likely to be killed by a firework
- 9 times more likely to die by having a TV fall on your head
Chris M Skinner
Chris Skinner is best known as an independent commentator on the financial markets through his blog, TheFinanser.com, as author of the bestselling book Digital Bank, and Chair of the European networking forum the Financial Services Club. He has been voted one of the most influential people in banking by The Financial Brand (as well as one of the best blogs), a FinTech Titan (Next Bank), one of the Fintech Leaders you need to follow (City AM, Deluxe and Jax Finance), as well as one of the Top 40 most influential people in financial technology by the Wall Street Journal's Financial News. To learn more click here...
