Spanish lottery to hand out €2.3bn in prizes

Spain is holding its traditional Christmas lottery known as “El Gordo” and handing out €2.3bn in winnings that will be a particularly sweet holiday treat at a time of economic woes and 20% unemployment.

The lottery, billed as the world’s richest, has no single jackpot but rather uses a complex share-the-wealth system in which thousands of five-digit numbers running from 00000 to 84999 win something.