Mega Millions jackpot now up to $640 million with no Tuesday winner
By Ralph Ellis, CNN
No winner emerged in the $565 million Mega Millions jackpot drawing on Tuesday night, and that means some lucky ticket-buyer has a chance of taking home an estimated $640 million ($328 million in cash) in the final Mega Millions drawing of 2022.
The jackpot rolled over because nobody picked all six numbers in Tuesday’s drawing: the white balls 9, 13, 36, 59 and 61, plus the gold Mega Ball with the number 11. The last drawing of the year will be held on Friday at 11 p.m. ET.
The jackpot will be the largest Mega Millions prize ever offered in the final week of any year “and could provide someone with a very happy New Year’s celebration,” the lottery website said.
The Mega Millions jackpot has topped $600 million just five times in its more than 20-year history, the lottery said. It last happened on July 29 when an anonymous partnership purchased a ticket in Illinois to win $1.3 billion (or $780 million in cash).
That was the second-largest Mega Millions jackpot ever won. The biggest was $1.5 billion, which was claimed by a South Carolina ticket buyer in the October 23, 2018, drawing.
Jackpot winners can collect their money in two ways: a one-time cash payment or the annuity option, which provides an initial payment, followed by 29 annual payments.
Mega Millions is played in 45 states, the District of Columbia and the US Virgin Islands. The lottery says the odds of winning that jackpot are 1 in 302,575,350.
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