The headline is a bit cheeky, but one cannot help but wonder if there is some truth to it. Let me explain, Warren Buffet, the billion dollar chairman of Berkshire Hathaway Inc, and the fourth richest man in the world, has recently stated that if you can guess the perfect March Madness bracket, he will give you 1 Billion Dollars!
That is a crazy prize for the March Madness bracket. More prize money than the Powerball lottery! Now to be fair, there is no cost to enter this competition, (unlike the lottery) and the odds of winning are 1 in 9.2 quintillion. yikes! (lottery is probably 1 in 200 million)
So the questions is……………Why? Why did Warren Buffet team up with the Founder of Quicken loans (Danny Gilbert) to offer such a mind boggling prize. Surely a million dollar prize would have been enough. There are many conspiracy theories swirling around the internet as to why they chose such an exorbitant amount. Here are some of mine 🙂
1) Berkshire Hathaway has a substantial stake in a number of media companies. With this type of exposure, people who have never seen a basketball game will be watching every game. The increased ratings will definitely mean mucho dollars for Warren and Gilbert.
2) Ahead of tax season, Intuit, Inc (owners of Quicken loans) are trying to get their name in the news. After the competition, all those basketball watching, billion dollar losing taxpayers, will download the Quicken software to send taxes (on not a billion dollars) to uncle Sam.
3) Warren and Gilbert are just two bored billionaires that understand there is no chance in hell anybody would win that money 🙂 (and even if you do …insurance will pick up the tab)
4)Obama, a well documented fan of college basketball and friend of Warren buffet, has made a deal with basketball coaches. They will fix the games in order for him to win the billion dollar prize. He will then use his pull to declare March a national holiday. More basketball revenue, higher salaries for coaches, everybody wins 🙂
Side note: can you imagine the reaction of conservative pundits, if Obama successfully picks the bracket!! LOL
5) Warren Buffet has decided that this is the only true way to flush out the time travelers! Maybe a time machine has been created in the future, and maybe there are time travelers in our world today. Think about it, this could be the one event that could flush them out! If you had a time machine in the future, wouldn’t you come back to March 2014??? (like BIFF did in back future 2!)…..think about it 🙂
Whatever the reason, I have just become a major college Basketball fan. The contest starts March 3rd, and you have to get your picks in by then. I am especially interested this yea,r because my Massachusetts Minutemen are looking like they will make it to the big dance! Don’t worry guys, if I win I will still be here for you..even though my back account will probably be ………………..Staying Mobile! 🙂