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Significant Digits For Friday, June 12, 2015

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$1

Zimbabwe is killing its ludicrously inflated currency. Zimbabweans with under 175 quadrillion Zimbabwean dollars in their bank accounts can exchange their money for $5 USD. Anything more will be exchanged at the rate of $1 USD to 35 quadrillion Zimbabwean dollars. [Yahoo News]

2-2

After a resounding victory over (one member of) the Cleveland Cavaliers last night, the Golden State Warriors have tied up the 2015 NBA Finals series. [ESPN]

10 out of 491 donors

Campaign finance watchdog the Center for Responsive Politics managed to track down data on 491 of the top 500 donors to federal candidates or political action committees in the 2014 cycle. They’re a crusty bunch: Their average age was 65.6 years, and only 10 were born after 1975. Remember, a society can only move forward when its entire electoral system is fueled by the old and rich. [OpenSecrets]

18 percent

That was the growth in Twitter’s user base this year through March 31, which is not great. It’s one of several possible reasons that CEO Dick Costolo is stepping down after five years at the company’s helm, with founder Jack Dorsey replacing him as interim CEO. [Wall Street Journal]

40 states

Everyone knows that people who drive slow in the left lane are by far some of the worst on this earth. Indiana is now one of 40 states with laws in place to force these monsters to pay for their crimes. [NBC News]

$8,000

Hang around with enough players of the game “Magic: The Gathering” and you’ll realize that its cards are worth a whole lot of money. But burglars aren’t always up on the fact that a box of cardboard playing cards can be worth several grand. Police helped one victim of a robbery in Virginia recover a box of 300 Magic cards worth $8,000. There’s always money in the black lotus stand, George Michael. [Ars Technica]


$122,874

The Federal Trade Commission is for the first time investigating a Kickstarter campaign. A board game called “The Doom That Came To Atlantic City” — which I originally assumed was Donald Trump-related but has more to do with the Cthulhu mythos — raised $122,874 through the crowdfunding platform but never got made. [The Washington Post]

$9.1 million per day

How much money the Pentagon spent on average to combat ISIS from last August through May, according to a new report. [The Hill]

$444.9 billion

How much money Americans spent at retailers and restaurants in May, up 1.2 percent over April. [The Wall Street Journal]

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If you see a significant digit in the wild, tweet it to me, @WaltHickey.

Walt Hickey was FiveThirtyEight’s chief culture writer.

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