POWERBALL JACKPOTS TO GET ‘BIGGER AND MORE REGULAR’
Bigger and more regular Powerball jackpots could soon be on the way with The Lottery Corporation, which runs the game, having more cash in its coffers than expected.
Analysts at investment bank Citi have upgraded their share assessment of the company which is listed on the Australian Stock Exchange (ASX).
To offset a potential fall in sales, the analysts expect The Lottery Corporation (TLC) to offer bigger Powerball prizes and more often and to increase the chance of winning a bigger sum.
The law governing the games require TLC to put aside a portion of sales – about 2.5 per cent for Powerball – in a prize reserve fund, the Australian Financial Review reported.
If the jackpot rolls over for a few weeks because nobody has won it, this reserve fund grows bigger than it is required to be due to there being no top prize pay out.
The excess funds allow the Corporation flexibility on how high jackpots can go from week to week.
There have been two huge jackpots already this year, when Powerball reached $200million in February and $150million last month.
‘Our analysis indicates that following a good year for jackpots, Lottery Corp will frequently skip steps in the sequence to increase the chance of generating large jackpots,’ Citi’s Adrian Lemme and James Wang wrote in a note to investors.
In layman’s terms, this means they expect TLC to offer bigger prizes, more regularly.
