The Powerball lottery jackpot grew to $1.5 billion after no one won Saturday's record jackpot of nearly $950 million in the multi-state lottery. The next drawing is Wednesday.
Millions of Americans anxiously checked their tickets for the winning combination of six numbers - 32, 16, 19, 57, 34 with a Powerball number of 13, reported Reuters.
"No Powerball jackpot winner," the Texas Lottery announced on Twitter hours after the numbers were drawn.
"Since nobody won tonight’s staggering $947.8 million jackpot, it has rolled to an estimated $1.3 billion for January 13," said a statement from officials in California, one of the 44 states, together with Washington D.C. and two U.S. territories, that participate in Powerball.
The grand prize for Powerball has climbed steadily for weeks after repeated drawings produced no big winners. This week ticket purchases surged along with the size of the pot, driving the prize beyond the $900 million reported earlier.
The grand prize in Saturday's drawing was worth $558 million for a winner choosing an immediate cash payout instead of annual payments over 29 years, according to lottery officials in California, one of the participating states.
The prize, which rises with every drawing in which the winning series of six numbers is not won, ranked as the largest jackpot for any lottery in North American history. With almost unimaginable riches at stake, many Americans who normally shun lotteries joined the long lines of people buying tickets at retail stores across the country.
The biggest jackpot ever so far was a $656 million Mega Millions prize won in 2012. Powerball's largest jackpot was more than $590 million in May 2013.
The odds of winning the jackpot are one in 292.2 million, which means players are really, really, really unlikely to win.
For some comparison, the chance of being struck by lightning in a year is about one in 960,000. But as lottery officials often note, people have no chance of winning if they don't buy a ticket.
No one has won Powerball's biggest prize since Nov. 4.
Powerball is played in 44 states as well as the District of Columbia, U.S. Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico.
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