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Country Guides
18 articles
- 🕶️Can You Stay Anonymous After Winning the Lottery? A Country-by-Country GuideThe same jackpot can leave you an unknown private citizen in one country and a front-page name across the border. Here is where anonymity is the default, where disclosure is mandatory, and how the US trust-and-LLC workaround actually fits in.11 min
- 🍀History of Bonoloto: Spain's Everyday Lottery Since 1988From its February 1988 launch with four weekly draws to today's daily format: how Bonoloto became Spain's low-cost everyday 6/49 lottery.10 min
- 🎫History of La Primitiva: Spain's Original Lottery from 1763 to a EUR 126M RecordFrom Carlos III's 1763 Royal Lottery to the restored 6/49 game and a new EUR 126M record in 2026: the story of Spain's most historic number lottery.11 min
- 🟡History of Mega Millions: From The Big Game to Billion-Dollar JackpotsFrom its 1996 launch as The Big Game to the modern $5 format: the complete history of Mega Millions, including rebrands, rule changes, record jackpots, and current odds.12 min
- ⭐History of EuroMillions: Europe's Biggest Multi-Country Lottery Since 2004From its 2004 launch to the new €250M era: the complete history of EuroMillions, including rule changes, record jackpots, and how 9 countries built a lottery giant.12 min
- History of Irish Lotto: Ireland's National Lottery Since 1988From the first draw in 1988 to the €19.06M record jackpot: the complete history of Irish Lotto, including rule changes, famous winners, and today's odds.11 min
- 🔴The $2.04 Billion Ticket: How Powerball Became the Largest Lottery Prize in HistoryOn 8 November 2022, a customer at Joe's Service Center in Altadena, California bought a Powerball ticket. Two days later, Edwin Castro claimed a jackpot of $2.04 billion — the largest single lottery prize ever paid anywhere in the world. Behind the headline figure sits a 30-year, multi-state, format-by-format engineering project designed to produce numbers like that on a regular schedule.14 min
- 🌎The Biggest Lotteries in South America: Mega-Sena, Baloto & Co.From Brazil's massive Mega-Sena to Colombia's Baloto: Discover the biggest jackpots, best odds, and most popular lotteries across South America.10 min
- Not the Christmas One: How El Gordo de la Primitiva Built Spain's Sunday Lottery RitualThere are two lotteries in Spain that share most of a name, and almost everyone confuses them. The famous El Gordo de Navidad is the Christmas draw with €4 billion in prizes and the schoolchildren singing the numbers. This article is about the other one — El Gordo de la Primitiva, the weekly Sunday draw with the Reintegro stake-refund mechanic — and why the two share a name almost entirely by accident.11 min
- 💶Taxes on Lottery Winnings in France: A Paradise for Winners?Good news for France fans: Lottery winnings are tax-free. But watch out for the wealth tax on real estate!8 min
- 💵Taxes on Lottery Winnings: How Much Does Uncle Sam Take in the USA?Winning the lottery is a dream, but taxes in the USA are a reality. Unlike many other countries, the IRS and states want their share. Here's what you need to know.10 min
- 💶Taxes on Lottery Winnings: Do You Have to Pay in Germany?The good news first: Lottery winnings are mostly tax-free in Germany. But be careful with interest and gifts – here are all the rules explained.8 min
- The 6/90 Game: How SuperEnalotto's Math Creates the World's Toughest LotteryMost national lotteries pick from 40 to 60 numbers. Italy picks from 90 — a choice inherited from the football-pool tradition of the 1950s. That single decision gives SuperEnalotto jackpot odds of 1 in 622 million, twice as hard as Powerball and four times harder than 6 aus 49. Italians don't seem to mind. Here is how the math works, and how the €371M record rollover was built.14 min
- How France Built a Lottery That Doubles as a National Heritage FundFirst drawn in 1976 at the Théâtre de l'Empire in Paris, the modern French Loto has spent five decades quietly evolving — but the most distinctive feature isn't the format. It's the way the lottery has been woven into the financing of France's cultural heritage, through a mechanism called Mission Patrimoine, that doesn't really exist in the German, British or Spanish equivalents.12 min
- 6 aus 49 Explained: Inside Germany's Federal Lottery ModelMost countries hand their national lottery to a single private licensee or one state-owned company. Germany splits 6 aus 49 across 16 cooperating state lotteries — a federalist quirk that shapes everything from where the money goes to who can sell tickets. Here is how Germany's longest-running lottery actually works, after seven decades of small but telling rule changes.15 min
- Major Lotteries in the United States: Complete GuideEverything you need to know about Powerball, Mega Millions, and other major US lotteries – rules, history, odds, and record jackpots explained.12 min
- Eurojackpot's Continental Build: From 7 Founding Countries to 19, Hosted in HelsinkiLaunched in 2012 to compete with EuroMillions, Eurojackpot has done something no European lottery did before: grown from 7 founding members to 19, expanded the format twice, and run every Tuesday and Friday draw out of a single Helsinki studio. This article traces the country-by-country build and explains why Germany, the bloc's largest player base, dominates the winners table.12 min
- Camelot, Allwyn and the British Lottery Habit: How UK Lotto Was Actually BuiltTwenty-two million Britons watched the first draw on a single Saturday night in November 1994. Three decades later a Czech-owned company runs the franchise, the draw machines are named after Arthurian knights, and the game has paid out over £48 billion to good causes — here is how it all came together.12 min