4 Biggest Global Lottery Wins of 2017 — Summing Up the Year

As the year draws to a close and we all look forward to a fresh start in 2018, we take a look at 4 of the biggest single ticket lottery wins of the year from across the globe. See just how much the lucky winners have won and whether or not they waived their right to anonymity.

2017 was not only the year of some of the biggest wins in history, it was actually the year of the biggest win EVER since lottery draws began.

1. US Powerball – $758 Million Win

There have been a lot of lucky lottery winners in 2017, some of them scooping really huge prizes. In fact, this year saw the single biggest lottery payout in history, anywhere in the world!

In August, Mavis Wanczuk from Massachusetts became the person to win the most money in a lottery prize draw ever when she scooped $758 million dollars on the US Powerball draw.

At the age of 53 and a medical worker at a health centre in her native state, she picked three tickets for the draw, one of which she chose her own numbers for and the other two chose to select quick picks, which assign a random selection of numbers. The win came from one of her randomly picked tickets and she was astonished to find she’d won such a huge amount of cash.

Mrs Wanczuk opted to take the whole payout in one go, which means that after taxes, she gets a “take home” win of $336 million. If she’d opted to take the cash in instalments, the winnings would have gone into her bank account in smaller amounts over a number of years. She’s still said to be in a state of shock and completely stunned by the amount of money she’s won. Naturally, she’s handed her notice in at the health centre she worked at and is going to make sure her family, friends and other loved ones are well looked after for the rest of their lives.

2. US Mega Millions – $393 Million Win

It seems August is a very lucky month to play the lottery in the USA as this is where we find our second huge lottery payout of the year, with one lucky winner who entered the Mega Millions draw taking home the entire jackpot of $393 million in one go!

This particular jackpot was the fifth largest during the history of this draw, and it’s the second biggest payout that has gone to a single ticket holder. It might not be as great a win as our first contender, but even so, it’s still a huge amount of money to come to terms with winning.

The name of the lucky winner hasn’t yet been revealed, but just like with our Powerball winner Mavis Wanczuk, they won’t get the full amount if they opt to take the lump sum. After taxes it’s estimated they’ll get around $247.3 million. Making the amount of tax the winner pays in the region of $61.8 million, plus any State Tax they’ll incur.

3. EuroMillions – £51,702,049.60 Win

The coveted EuroMillions draw has had its fair share of big winners over the years, but this year in July a claim was made by a single ticket holder who won the £51,702,049.60 jackpot, making it the fourth EuroMillions jackpot won in the UK this year and one of the biggest wins ever.

The UK has had a great deal of luck with this particular draw and just a few weeks after this draw was made and won another UK ticket holder scooped a cool £14 million in another single ticket payout.

The prize has already been paid out after the ticket was validated, however, the winner of the jackpot has chosen to remain anonymous. This amount of money means that the person lucky enough to win it is as rich as Ed Sheeran and Welsh Football star Gareth Bale, which isn’t bad for simply selecting a few random numbers and hoping for the best!

4. Malaysian Lotto – $16 Million Win

For our final story we need to look the Far East. Over in Malaysia in September this year, it was revealed that a lucky businessman from Penang had won the largest jackpot on offer in the countries lottery, and although the amount of money picked up isn’t anywhere near as big as some of our winners, it’s still a breathtaking amount.

The lucky winner from the country (who like many other big winners doesn’t want to be identified) spent around RM50 on 25 different sets of lucky pick numbers, in which draw numbers are randomly assigned – much in the same way Mavis Wanczuk’s win occurred. On the night of the draw, which was Saturday 13th September, the winner didn’t check his ticket, but the next day a friend of his mentioned that it was believed the winning ticket was in Penang. He checked his numbers and discovered he had won the jackpot – a total prize of $16 million dollars.

Speaking after his win, the anonymous recipient said “I didn’t take note of my friend’s alert and continued my daily tasks. I went for my breakfast and started working at home” He added that “Suddenly the jackpot alert crossed my mind and I started checking through the tickets. When I saw a ticket match the last two numbers of the result, which were 52 and 53, I was pretty sure that I’d won,” The lucky winner told his younger brother to check the rest of the numbers over for him to make sure he wasn’t dreaming, and it turned out he’d won the jackpot! “We were so excited” he said “that we could not stop screaming and began running around the house…”

According to stories in the local press in Penang, this was the first time the unnamed winner had ever placed a ticket on the lotto there, because he preferred to try and win money through betting on sports instead. The businessman in question has commented that he plans to donate some of his winnings to charity that he’ll pay off some loans and put some money into properties in Penang.