Quick One, formally the internet-only national self-government lottery (インターネット専用全国自治宝くじ), began sales on April 1, 2022, according to the Japanese Wikipedia entry on 宝くじ1.
It is not Japan's first internet-only lottery.
Japanese lotteries are issued by local authorities, meaning prefectures and designated cities, with sales operations mainly contracted to Mizuho Bank1. The legal basis is the Act on Premiums-bearing Certificates (当せん金付証票法, Showa 23 Law No. 144), enacted in July 1948 to replace the Temporary Funds Adjustment Act, with the stated purpose of absorbing floating purchasing power and contributing to the raising of local government funds1.
Prize limits are set by law. Where there is an addition (a carryover), a prize of up to 5 million times the face value per winning ticket can be set1. Numbers 3 and Numbers 4 have a ceiling of 50 million yen, raised from 20 million yen in March 20121.
The entry states that the law sets no age limit on buying a lottery ticket or receiving a prize, but that when a person under 20 receives one, payment is made to a guardian1.
What it means for players
Quick One is sold only over the internet, so there is no ticket to buy at a stand and no paper slip to check. The wider Japanese lottery market remains dominated by paper products: open tickets, scratch cards and number-selection games such as Loto 6, Loto 7 and Numbers1. The entry gives the lottery's overall return ratio as 45.7 percent, against 74.8 percent for publicly run racing, whose effective return ratio it puts at 58.5 percent1. No age limit applies to buying or claiming, but payouts to under-20 winners go to a guardian1.
What happens next
It does not report any end date or draw schedule for Quick One.
Sources1 sources
- 宝くじ - Wikipedia, ja.wikipedia.org
