Alexander Zemskov, a locksmith from Nizhny Novgorod, became the winner of the New Year’s draw of the Russian Lotto lottery. The amount of his winnings amounted to 1 billion rubles. This was reported “RIA Novosti” with reference to the distributor of state lotteries “Stoloto”.
Alexander Zemskov found out about his victory on the air of the New Year’s Billion draw on January 1, but applied for a win in mid-February. “However, the winner applied for the win much later – for the first few days, the spouses could not believe what had happened, and then they studied the information on the procedure for processing a large win,” the company said.
“We deliberately waited for a pause so that the hype around the draw subsided. We decided to personally come to the Stoloto lottery center, finally find out everything, provide the original ticket and submit documents for registration. Even now we can’t believe that this is not a dream, but a reality,” he said. Alexander Zemskov added that after receiving the winnings, his family would “say goodbye to loans” and also buy a new car.
After deducting the tax, Mr. Zemsky will receive 850.1 million rubles. within 180 calendar days after presentation of the ticket.
In the circulation of “New Year’s Billion” 2.5 billion rubles were raffled off. More than 8 million lottery tickets have been won. The first “lottery billionaire” in Russia was Nadezhda Bartosh, who won the Russian Lotto New Year’s draw in 2020.