New Jersey Lottery announces unaudited fiscal year results
Lottery Contributes over a Billion Dollars to State for 7th Year in a Row
NEW JERSEY – The unaudited sales revenues for Fiscal Year 2024 (FY2024) that ended June 30. Sales for the year totaled $3.6 billion, the fourth highest in the history of the lottery and a 2.5 percent decrease over the prior year, New Jersey Lottery Executive Director James Carey announced Thursday.
The slight reduction in sales is attributed, in part, to expanded options for entertainment dollars. Lottery sales have exceeded $3 billion annually since FY2015.
FY2024 marks the seventh time the Lottery contribution to the state pension fund has exceeded $1 billion dollars, coming in at $1.1 billion. The contribution was included in Governor Phil Murphy’s $7.1 billion full pension payment. The FY2024 payment marks the first time in a quarter of a century that the State has contributed 100 percent of the Actuarially Determined Contribution four years in a row, making good on the Administration’s commitment to teachers, police officers, and other public sector employees.
The Lottery’s sales and the contribution to the pension system are unaudited and preliminary. The Lottery expects the total contribution to the State to increase slightly after the Lottery’s financial audit is completed later this year.
Lottery revenue was boosted by Powerball sales of $369.2 million, a 19.6 percent increase compared to the prior year. Powerball had six jackpots won during FY2024, three were over $1 billion dollars and one was over $800 million. Gains were also seen with Pick-6 with Double Play which had sales surge to $80.1 million, a 23 percent increase of the prior year. Pick-6 sales benefitted from the largest jackpot in two decades. Fast Play Progressive had sales of $57.56 million, a 17.2 percent increase. Players love the excitement and large progressive jackpots of the game.
Some games did experience decreases in sales, such as the foundational daily numbers games of Pick-3 with FIREBALL with sales of $389.28 million, a 2.2 percent dip, and Pick-4 with FIREBALL with sales of $236.23 million, 5.8 percent less than the previous fiscal year. Scratch-Off game sales were down 6 percent from the prior year.
To address the decline, the Lottery is planning on releasing new games with a distinctly New Jersey appeal for players. While Mega Millions sales of $258.75 million were down 11.9 percent from the previous year, they were up 99.4 percent from FY2022 to FY2023, so some decline was expected. The game had seven jackpots won in FY2024, but only one managed to pass the $1 billion mark.
“FY2024 will go down in history as one of the most exciting years for New Jersey Lottery players,” said Carey. “We experienced the largest win state history, a $1.13 billion Mega Millions jackpot sold in Monmouth County, as well as a number of other life changing jackpots.”
New Jersey players took home $2.15 billion in prizes, including over 275 prizes of $100,000 or more, with 51 of those prizes being worth $1 million or more. Winners included: a Million Dollar Replay Grand Prize winner, 15 second-tier Powerball jackpot winners of $1 million to $2 million, nine second-tier Mega Millions winners of $1 million to $3 million, a $25.8 million Pick-6 prize, a $30 million Pick-6 prize split between two tickets, a $221 million Powerball win, and of course the $1.13 billion Mega Millions ticket, which was the fifth largest jackpot in game history – as of yet unclaimed.
The Lottery is an integral component of the State’s economy. Approximately 6,700 businesses throughout the Garden State prosper from their partnership with the Lottery. In FY2024, retailers earned $212.6 million in commissions and an additional $3.02 million in bonuses, which are connected to the selling of winning top-tier tickets. These partners, many of them small businesses, are vital to the Lottery’s success.
The Lottery’s sales and marketing vendor, Northstar New Jersey Lottery Group, met the performance targets that are used to calculate an incentive payment. The calculation of the incentive payment will not be finalized until the Lottery’s financial audit is completed.
The Lottery is the State’s largest non-tax revenue producer for the residents of New Jersey, and the fifth largest overall. Since its inception in 1970, the Lottery has contributed over $33.6 billion to the State, helping to support many worthwhile programs and services. Lottery profits currently help bolster the public employee pension system for teachers, police, fire personnel and other public employees under a 30-year agreement signed into law in 2017.
The New Jersey Lottery audited financial reports can be found here.
