Alternatively: a double or nothing scheme.<p>Crowdsource ~$146 million and only buy half the lotto tickets. For each of the ~11 million combinations of regular numbers, buy 13 tickets covering half the possible powerball numbers.<p>Assume you win the $800 million jackpot and lose 50% to taxes, you have $400 million left over. You spend ~$292 million to double your investors money and have ~$107 million left over.<p>Assume you don&#x27;t win the $800 million jackpot, you still have 13 $1 million tickets left over. You can either pay that back to your investors, or keep it for yourself and point to a clause in a contract they signed saying that you&#x27;d only pay out if you won the jackpot.<p>Somehow I doubt it&#x27;s legal to do something like that, but it&#x27;s interesting nonetheless.