According to practically every single news bulletin throughout the world, The Republic of Greece, AKA, The Hellenic Republic the “cradle of western civilisation,” currently has a bit of a cash flow crisis, is little short of the readies and is struggling to pay its debts! Aren’t we all?

However, being Greek didn’t bring any financial solace either to film maker Costis Mitsotakis, who is the only Greek inhabitant of the Spanish village of Sodeto. This is the tiny village tucked away in the municipality of Alberuela de Tubo, Huesca, Spain where the entire population of 70 households, decided to pool their resources in order to buy tickets for Spain’s biggest lottery – El Gordo and then won first prize – a staggering NINE HUNDRED and TWENTY-THREE MILLION dollars – yes you did read that right $923,000,000 which meant that the minimum every household walked away with was $132,000 apiece!

All except one that is, no prizes for guessing the missed household – right first time – Costis Mitsotakis! Sadly it appears that when his neighbours were going around every house in the village persuading people to buy El Gordo lottery tickets, Mitsotakis, who lives in a barn half a mile outside Sodeto, mistakenly got overlooked.

Fortunately not all is doom and gloom for Mitsotakis, as he had been trying to sell some land without much success, It now appears that after learning of their lottery win, a neighbour called to say he would buy it and now more neighbours have put in offers on the land; however Mitsotakis doesn’t want any bad feelings in such a small village and has refused to get into a bidding war! He sounds like a very nice guy indeed!

Spain is of course noted, amongst other things, for its addiction to big money lotteries and raffles and with just over 1 day to go before the next Spanish Special Millionaire Raffle is due to be drawn, then this weekend is no exception. Up for grabs is a very tasty ONE HUNDRED and TEN MILLION dollars, which should help a little until your next payday! To be in with a chance of winning, you need a ticket and the place to buy a ticket for tomorrow’s Special Millionaire Raffle is right here at WinTrillions!

As the old saying goes, “it ain’t over ‘til the fat lady sings” and for the tiny town of Granen in the north eastern Spanish region of Huesca, the “fat lady” has been belting out her song loudly and clearly. Spain’s El Gordo de la Primitiva lottery aka “The Fat One” – the world’s richest lottery – this year worth a mind-blowing $3,567,000,000, was finally drawn at a three hour televised ceremony from Madrid yesterday.

For the lucky 2,000 cash strapped inhabitants of Granen it seems that all their Christmases have been rolled into one – Lady Luck has arrived – Santa is finally “in the building!” The top prize was shared between the holders of ticket number 58268 which appeared on 1,800 winning tickets, all of which were sold in Granen. The good news is; each winner will pocket around four hundred thousand greenbacks – well I expect they’ve had worse days!

The El Gordo draw dates back to 1812 and marks the beginning of the Christmas season in Spain has seen lottery fever reach epidemic proportions since tickets first went on sale about 8 weeks ago with long, long queues forming at lottery outlets throughout the country. Indeed thieves have even been caught on security cameras attempting to rob lottery outlets in Madrid.

Rather than a single jackpot lottery the main aim of the El Gordo draw is a “fair shares for all” raffle which encourages whole bunches of people to pool their money in order to buy shares of several or many tickets and means that it’s not uncommon for multiple prizes to go to the same town.

Now just in case you missed out on El Gordo you might like to know that Spain is running another big lottery on January 6 to mark the Feast of the Epiphany, this one is called El Nino and is the second most important draw in the Spanish Lottery draw calendar and just in case you’re wondering whether to bother; let me tell you that the top prize is $1,097,900,070 – that’s one thousand and ninety seven million, nine hundred thousand and seventy bucks – or £1.097 BILLION – if that floats your boat!

As always you can buy lottery tickets for El Nino, as well as many other of the world’s biggest and richest lotteries from right here at WinTrillions.

The police in Madrid, Spain are hunting for a gang of robbers who busted into a lottery outlet in the Moratalaz district of Madrid and stole a whole load of cash and lottery tickets. Although the exact amount of money and tickets stolen is not confirmed, Police believe it to be thousands.

The robbers broke into the lottery shop smashed their way through an office wall and used a thermal lance to burn a 6 inch hole in the safe and then made a quick exit with a large amount of Euros and a stash of lottery tickets, but not before starting a fire in a waste paper basket in the hope of covering their tracks. A thermal lance; my how times have changed; I always thought the quickest way to crack a safe was to “blow the bloody doors off”

The robbery came to light after fire fighters were called to deal with the blazing waste paper basket. Nobody has yet been arrested but the blaggers did leave behind a number of items, including a pick, screwdrivers and sunglasses.

This is the second time in a week that Madrid lottery outlets have been targeted; there was a failed attempt to rob the famous Dona Manolita lottery shop in Madrid; the would-be thieves were caught on surveillance cameras disarming the alarm system and trying to force the door, however they did not manage to break in.

Robbing lottery shops in Spain doesn’t come as any great surprise as the whole of Spain has been gripped by lottery fever, ever since the tickets for El Gordo del la Primitiva lottery first went on sale 8 weeks ago, particularly when there’s a mega $3,567,000,000 up for grabs and due to be drawn in just 2 days time.

There’s just time for you to get a slice of El Gordo action; but only if you move quickly. The easiest and safest way to do that is right here at WinTrillions; just follow the links and you’re in; what’s more you don’t ever have to go robbing lottery outlets in Spain to get hold of your ticket.

If you want some serious lottery action this week then you’ll need to start thinking big; I mean very big, gigantic; colossal, immense, vast, mammoth – where’s my thesaurus? This isn’t even about winning a few hundred grand or even a million; this week even millions pale into insignificance as we’ve moved up a notch to BILLIONS!

Let’ start with tomorrow – Tuesday 20^th December:

• USA – Mega Millions – $152,000,000
• Italy – Super Enalotto – $57,588,000
• Europe – EuroMillions – $19,500,000

What about Wednesday 21^st December?

• USA – Powerball - $104,000,000
• USA – Florida Lotto – $49,000,000
• USA – Indiana Hoosier Lotto – $26,000,000
• USA – California Super Lotto – $17,000,000
• USA – New York Lotto – $13,500,000

Thursday 22^nd December – the “lottery of lotteries” – the “big daddy” – the “Fat One”:

• Spain – El Gordo de la Primitiva – $3,567,000,000 ($3,5 BILLION)

In my book, we’re looking at some heavy duty wedge here, and there will be a whole bunch of very, very happy people by the close of business on Thursday and there’s no reason whatsoever why you couldn’t be right up there amongst them – all you need is a winning ticket and the simplest and quickest way to buy your ticket is right here at WinTrillions.