Hoaxes and false believes of the Christmas lottery
If you believe in bad luck and want to scare it away for the Christmas Lottery, we will teach you all the myths, hoaxes and superstitions around the 22th of each year. There are a lot of stories and believing around this draw but, what is true in all that? Keep reading and let's find out to scare away the evil spirits.
Low and high numbers never win
One of the myths around El Gordo lottery draw is the belief that low and high numbers never win. These are the statistics that completely refute this belief:
- The numbers between 0 and 10,000 have been awarded on 65 occasions,which completely dismisses the popular feeling of opting against low numbers.
- As for the high numbers, it is true that numbers from 66,001 to 99,999 have been awarded only in 8 occasions, but there is a very easy explanation for this: up until 2004, 66,000 numbers were issued; from 2005 to 2010, 85,000 were issued; and from 2011, 100,000 numbers are issued. Since the 2011 Christmas Draw, the odds of winning a low, medium or high number are exactly the same.
The number 00000 is reserved for the Royal House
For years it was said that Loterías y Apuestas del Estado reserved the number 00000 for the Spanish King and the Royal House, but this is not true. The Royal House itself confirmed to the press in 2011 that it was "an unsubstantiated rumour" and that "institutionally no tenth-share ticket is given away". The number, in fact, it is always available in various points of sale.
If you buy a ticket in a famous lottery shop you have more chances to win
One of the most widespread myths of the Christmas Lottery draw is the idea that the jackpot always tends to fall in the “big” points of sale, and it is true that these famous points of sale have distributed many important Christmas prizes throughout their history, but it has a very easy explanation: although no point of sale ever reveals its sales figures because "it's bad luck"; the most important points of sale in Spain get to sell up to 80 million euros of Christmas Lottery. It is not surprising that any of the “big ones” regularly distributes big prizes: the more different numbers sold, the highest the chances of hitting the Jackpot.
If a big point of sale sells 30% of the 100,000 numbers that go to the rotating drum, it is much more likely that they will always award some big prize than a small point of sale. Therefore, the probability of winning El Gordo de Navidad will be the same no matter where you buy your tenth-share ticket, it's that simple.
On more than one occasion, the big points of sale have exhausted all their Christmas Lottery stock for sale several days before the draw without distributing any significant prize in the end.
If you choose a specific number, the probability of winning is higher
In the Christmas Draw there are 100,000 numbers in the rotating drum, and each number has exactly the same chance of winning. For each number purchased we will have a 1 in 100,000 chance of winning El Gordo, so the more different numbers we buy, the more likely we are to win it. It doesn’t matter if the number we play this time is different from the one we played last year, whether it has already been awarded, whether it is a "pretty" or "ugly" number, or whether it is sold in one lottery point of sale or another.
Although it is very difficult to win El Gordo, it is much more likely to win the first prize in the Christmas Lottery than to win the first prize in the Primitiva or EuroMillions, where the probability is one in 139.8 million! Although mathematics and common sense say that it is very unlikely to win El Gordo, the wishful thinking or fear that somebody close to us will win it and not us, drives more than 75% of Spaniards to play. What is clear is that every year there are people who win it.
The 2019 Christmas Draw was rigged
In the 2019 Christmas Draw, a great deal of controversy and social alarm was generated when a video that recorded a worker who reintroduced a ball that had fallen to the ground went viral on social networks. Loterías y Apuestas del Estado officials were even accused of rigging the draw, and people requested made a request for the draw to be repeated. Loterías y Apuestas del Estado denied the rumour after clarifying that both its officials and their direct family members are not allowed to buy tenth-share tickets for the Christmas Draw or any other draw.
The Law 13/2011 on the Regulation of Gambling, in Article 6.2, specifies that "shareholders, owners, stakeholders or significant holders of the gaming operator, its management staff and employees directly involved in the development of the games, as well as their spouses or people they live with, first degree ascendants and descendants, are not allowed to participate in the games that they manage or operate, regardless of whether the participation in the games by any of the above-mentioned persons occurs directly or indirectly, through third parties, both physical or legal.”
The most common superstitions of the Spanish Christmas Lottery
The Christmas Draw has always been linked to popular superstitions with the hope to attract the Goddess of Fortune. Although each person has their own fixations, these are the most common superstitions that most likely you have heard of:
- It is common for bars, companies, associations, etc., to always play the same number. The reason for this is just in case that number is awarded just the year when they haven’t bought it, and also due to the belief that if they remain faithful to playing the same number, sooner or later it will be awarded.
- Many people usually look for numbers linked to special dates, such as birthdays, anniversaries, the birthday of a son or a daughter, the day of their wedding, etc. Other dates are usually important events of that year, like sport victories, the death of famous people, or even the death of a relative!
- Most of the people who never win any Christmas Lottery prize, usually repeat year after year the popular phrase “The most important thing is to be healthy.” That is why many people consider 22 December of every year as the Day of Health.
- Many people buy Christmas Lottery in places where a tragedy has occurred because they believe that fate will make up for the tragedy occurred with good luck.
- Despite the fact that black cats are associated with bad luck, people say that rubbing a tenth-share ticket on the back of a black cat increases the chances of winning. Some people also say that rubbing your tenth-share ticket on the tummy of a pregnant woman or on the back of a hunchbacked person will give you good luck.
- When a lottery point of sale sells the winning ticket of El Gordo, its sales increase dramatically the next year because people believe that the first prize will be awarded again in the same place, and therefore they buy their tickets there again. They are afraid that they will regret not having bought their ticket there if they sell the winning ticket again.
- When there is a big queue to buy the lottery, you must queue up on the left side of the queue on odd days and on the right side on even days.
- Some people say that if you want to win the Christmas Lottery you must step into the lottery shop with your left foot and make sure that the lottery seller hands you the ticket with their right hand.
Whether or not you are superstitious, whether or not you believe in the influence of good and bad energies, don’t forget to buy your Christmas Lottery ticket. What is true and 100% sure is that every year somebody wins El Gordo lottery!
