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CNN Live At Daybreak
Powerball Jackpot Increases
Aired August 23, 2001 - 07:24 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CAROL LIN, CNN ANCHOR: No grand prize winners in last night's Powerball drawing. The numbers, as you can see them here, were 2, 36, 39, 30, 28 and the Powerball number was 10.
COLLEEN MCEDWARDS, CNN ANCHOR: So that means the huge jackpot rolls over -- will grow even more prior to Saturday's drawing. They're talking about figures like $300 million now.
LIN: Wow! It could get pretty
(CROSSTALK)
LIN: It could be a record -- maybe.
MCEDWARDS: Well, this Saturday's $280 million, maybe even plus jackpot, seems out of reach. There may be another way to grab a smaller pot of gold.
LIN: CNN's Joya Dass looks at how far your lottery money could go, if you put it in the stock market.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JOYA DASS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Lotteries are a $40 billion industry, and the most popular form of legal gambling in the U.S., even with the worst odds of winning, an average of about 1 in 12 million.
The aim of lotteries is to benefit the public, but the cumulative cost of these tickets can take a toll on household budgets.
Residents of Rhode Island spent an average of $823 per capita on lotto tickets last year, more than any other state in the country. Not far behind is South Dakota. Residents there spent an average of $774, and Delaware with an average of $713.
KEITH WHYTE, COUNCIL ON PROBLEM GAMBLING: Anybody who has a good understanding of odds is going to realize that gambling is not the best way to go about winning and saving money. In the long run, you will lose.
DASS: And even though some think the stock market is just another form of legalized gambling, it's still a safer bet than winning the lottery. Take a look at what someone could have earned with that $823, or $68 a month: With an S&P 500 index fund -- which has historic returns of about 10 percent a year -- in 30 years, that one-year contribution could grow to $13,000, or $137,000 if they invested the same amount each year.
How about an average money market account? In 30 years a conservative investor would see that $800 grow to about $1,900, or just under $40,000 after 30 years of steady contributions at 3 percent returns.
PETER DITERESA, "MORNINGSTAR": Think about the long term, not about the quick payoff, but just about the benefits you get from investing over time and allowing compounding to really work for you.
DASS (on camera): Bottom line: If you're leaving your financial planning to the numbers, you might want to rethink your strategy.
"That's Your Money" -- I am Joya Dass for CNN Financial News in New York.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
LIN: Well, for the rest of you, who still want to buy tickets for Saturday's drawing, we're going to go to Tony Cooper. He is the President of the Powerball Group. He is in Washington, D.C. this morning -- good morning, Tony.
TONY COOPER, POWERBALL GAME GROUP: Good morning, Carol.
LIN: All right
(CROSSTALK)
COOPER: How are you doing?
LIN: Well, nobody won, so is there any chance that y'all made a mistake?
COOPER: Well, actually we had over 3.3 million winners last night, winning anywhere from $3...
LIN: Oh, Tony, you are so diplomatic.
COOPER: ... all the way up to $300,000 in the lower-tier prizes.
LIN: Oh, that's not bad.
COOPER: However, there was not a major jackpot winner.
LIN: No.
COOPER: That -- as a matter of fact, there were 43 winners of $100,000, which meant that they were just one number away from winning the jackpot.
LIN: Oh.
COOPER: And I just can't imagine how they feel this morning.
LIN: That has got to be painful, although $100,000 is a nice consolation prize.
Do you know how many people played nationwide?
COOPER: We had approximately $80 million in wagering done yesterday -- probably about anywhere from 40 to -- approximately 40 million people...
LIN: Wow!
COOPER: ... played the lottery yesterday.
LIN: Is it true that some states sold more tickets than their entire population?
COOPER: Well, obviously. In the District of Columbia, we sold over two million tickets yesterday, and we have a population of 500,000.
LIN: Yes. So what are the chances then -- what are the odds that you think that thing is going to top $300,000 (sic) this Saturday?
COOPER: Well, depending upon sales. If we have a surge in sales on Saturday, and we will analyze the sales for the next two days, it's a possibility that it can exceed or reach $300 million. However, with our message that we're giving now, which is to play responsibly -- to play for fun. This is a fun game. This is not a financial investment. We want people to realize that you're supposed to have fun when you play this game.
LIN: Yes.
COOPER: As a matter of fact, when you play the Powerball or any lottery product, just remember three things: have fun, have more fun, and if the jackpot is big enough, have big fun.
LIN: You bet. And share the wealth. That's what we like to say.
Did you hear about any problems, though, in the lines or at any of the stores with people buying tickets?
COOPER: Well, with the volume that we had, we had a few stores that just went down, because the telephone lines couldn't take the volume. We had an incident in Missouri where somebody accidentally cut a cable to over 100 different agents. So we -- but we have these problems throughout the -- we sell tickets through terminals that are electronically hooked up to a central gaming system. So when you're dealing with computers, sometimes you have glitches. But for the most part, it went very smoothly yesterday.
LIN: But nobody got hurt?
COOPER: No, not that I am aware of.
LIN: What happened to those 15,000 tickets that were stolen in the state of Indiana? Any word on that investigation?
COOPER: I have no word on that investigation. We have looked into that. Those tickets would have been declared invalid if a person had presented the winning Powerball ticket on one of those tickets.
LIN: Tony Cooper, I know you can't by law play Powerball. But I'm just wondering, what's your lucky number?
COOPER: My lucky number is -- well, I can't -- you're right, I can't play. And I don't have a lucky number. I believe that luck is a variable that just hits randomly. So any number could be a lucky number for me.
LIN: 1 in 80 million -- that's the number we keep hearing -- the chances of winning. Thanks so much, Tony Cooper of Powerball -- we wish everybody luck -- Colleen.
COOPER: Good luck to you as well.
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