Lotto cash leaving in foreign suitcases Winning ways
Watch out lamb and wool, new figures show New Zealand is also exporting millions of dollars in the form of Lotto wins by foreigners. Jacques Steenkamp reports.
They came to see the sights, and ended up taking home the silver.
Overseas visitors to New Zealand have won nearly $4 million playing Lotto in the past decade.
Figures released under the Official Information Act revealed 62 foreign nationals won prizes ranging from $1000 up to $500,000 between 2007 and 2017.
Another big win not included in the official statistics went to an Australian holidaymaker who won $1 million in January 2014.
Aussies also picked up two prizes of $500,000, and another of $405,000.
Both residents and nonresidents, including short-term visitors, are allowed to play Lotto and collect winnings.
The majority of the 62 winners were from Australia, but others were from a range of countries, including, Canada, Ireland, Japan and the Philippines. ‘‘For context, note that during the same period over 12,000 prizes of over $1000 were won (by Kiwis),’’ Lotto NZ spokeswoman Emilia Mazur said.
Backpacker Matthew Zimerman, 22, from Cincinnati, Ohio, buys scratchies about twice a week and sometimes plays the Lotto draw because simply put: ‘‘I like to win money and prizes’’.
It was cheaper to play in the United States, he said, where for about $2 you could enter lotteries to win hundreds of millions of dollars.
‘‘I do like to gamble. What can I say? Got to substitute something for the blackjack table.’’
The amount of tickets sold probably increased over the holidays because people were buying them as gifts, he said.
Alex Brammer, 27, from Britain, has been in New Zealand on a working holiday for about six months.
She was given a scratchie card as a secret Santa Christmas present. She normally buys them with a friend about once a month ‘‘to see if we can win our grocery shopping – but we never have’’.
Darren Mollaghan, 32, from Ireland prefers scratchie cards to the Lotto draw.
‘‘Just for fun. I’m not relying on it. They make a good gift.’’
Lotto celebrated its 30th birthday in July and in that time has given away more than $10 billion in prizes to 450 million winners.
The biggest ever prize is the $44 million Powerball prize won by a couple from the Hibiscus Coast in November, 2016.