Hundreds Win $4 Million Philippine Lottery Jackpot After Guessing Extremely Rare Combination

Hundreds of people hit the jackpot of a Philippine lottery game on Saturday after they guessed a combination composed of multiples of nine, prompting speculation whether it was a complete coincidence or a clever conspiracy.

According to the state-run Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office, 433 people got the winning combination of 09-45-36-27-18-54 in the 6/55 Grand Lotto game where bettors pick six numbers from one to 55.

The over $4 million prize up for grabs would be split between the 433 winners, leaving them with over $9,000 each.

Meanwhile, 331 bettors who guessed five of the six winning numbers will take home around $2,000 and 2,491 people who guessed four of six digits will get around $50.

Winning the lottery is hard enough, with Edson Guido, data analytics head of local media network ABS-CBN, tweeting, “to get the 6 winning digits out of 55, that's 1 out of 28,989,675... or 0.000003%.”

Some social media users could not help but be suspicious of the "unbelievable" results.

“433 winners, 433 tickets getting that 1/28 million chance…Not to mention all lucky numbers being multiples of Nine (9, 18, 27, 36, 45, 54) that form a diagonal line on the ticket card,” @brentiusiacomus tweeted.

“Hard to believe, PCSO, unless trillions of tickets were bought. Unless this is a divine sign.”

“Which is wilder? The fact that there were 433 Lotto 6/55 jackpot winners or the fact that the winning combination are the multiples of 9?” wrote journalist Ivan Saldajeno.

“Here's an even wilder stat: there are more jackpot winners than 2nd place winners (you guessed 5 of 6 right; only 331),” he added.