Mega Millions: Jackpot Of $144 Million At Stake In August 15 Drawing As Fever Builds

The Mega Millions jackpot reached a mouth-watering $144 million for the August 15 drawing after the numbers that came up on Tuesday matched none of the 26.3 million tickets sold for the nationwide lottery game.

Ticket sales have risen sharply since August 5 when the Mega Millions jackpot hit $100 million for the first time in a single sequence of drawings since May 9. The August 15 $144 million jackpot is the highest since May 20, when one ticket sold in Pennsylvania hit a $149 million jackpot.

That Pennsylvania winner has not yet come forward, more than three months after purchasing the winning ticket at a gas station in White Oaks.

For a jackpot under $150 million, the 26,358,673 tickets sold marked the third-highest total of the year. The Mega Millions lottery has not seen a jackpot winner since June 27, when one player in Texas won a $33 million top prize. That winner is also still laying low as the prize money remains unclaimed.

Tuesday’s drawing was the 13th in a row without a jackpot winner, the second-longest winnerless streak of the year. Starting January 7, Mega Millions went 20 drawings before a winner matched all six Mega Millions numbers to win a whopping $400 million jackpot. In fact, two winners in Florida and Maryland split that jackpot.

The $144 million up for grabs on Friday, August 15 is the jackpot that would go to a Mega Millions winner — if there is one — who chooses to take the cash as 30 annual payments. If that were the case, the winner would immediately receive a payout of $2,167,407 before taxes. The annual payments would get larger each year until the final check arrived in the year 2043 when the lucky Mega Millions player or the player’s estate would collect a chunk of change worth $8,921,340, according to the lottery-watchers at USAMega.

But that’s not how it usually goes. The vast majority of Mega Millions winners want all of their money up front. Because of the way lotteries are financed with bonds that take 30 years to mature, the actual amount paid to a winner who takes the “cash option” is estimated at $84 million before taxes take their bite, which usually comes to about 25 percent, plus more for state tax in states which tax lottery winnings.

The August 12 drawing also featured no second-prize winners. But there were still plenty of smaller prizes to be claimed. To find out if you have any Mega Millions cash coming you way, check to see if your ticket matches these numbers:

32 — 53 — 60 — 63 — 68 Mega Ball 6

Friday’s $144 million Mega Millions drawing will be held in Atlanta, Georgia, at 10:59 pm Eastern Time.