当保罗•费舍尔(Paul Fischer)周五晚查询银行帐户余额时，他遇到了一个惊喜：他的帐户余额一下子变成了88,888,888,888.88美元。这确实是一个非常吉利的数字，而且是将近890亿美元。
当然，这是SunTrust Bank的一个技术性失误造成的，银行很快就改正了错误。其他人的帐户也可能发生过类似的事。
费舍尔说，你说说看，880亿美元，我能用这笔钱干点什么呢？他有佛罗里达主题公园的珠宝特许经销权。他说，或许有几个我们这样的人，就能让 SunTrust Bank倾覆。
费舍尔还有其他的想法。在错误改正之前，他问SunTrust的一名业务代表，在这笔钱被银行追回之前，他是否可以把它转到一个生息帐户，把利息捐给慈善机构。总利息将有730多万美元。
银行说，不可以。
周六早晨之前，这笔钱就从他的帐户中消失了。
他说，都没了，我又变穷了，我当了五个小时的亿万富翁。
这类银行失误经常发生。不过费舍尔提出了一个有趣的问题：如果你真的拥有890亿美元达五个小时，你会怎么办？
你会拿这笔钱做什么？规则是，五个小时之后，你必须把钱退回去──无论你用这笔钱买了什么或投资了什么项目，你也都必须退回去。
When Paul Fischer checked his bank account Friday night, he had a happy surprise. His balance had exploded to $88,888,888,888.88. A very lucky number indeed, and close to $89 billion。
Of course, the balance was a technical error by SunTrust Bank, which quickly fixed the problem. It also may have occurred in other accounts。
“You say, Eighty-eight billion, what can I do with that?” said Mr. Fischer, who owns a jewelry concessionaire for Florida theme parks. “Maybe a handful of us could have brought down SunTrust Bank。”
Mr. Fischer had other ideas as well. Before the problem was fixed, he asked a SunTrust rep if he could move the money to an interest-bearing account until it was reclaimed and donate the interest to charity. Total interest: more than $7.3 million。
The bank said no。
The money was stripped out of his account by Saturday morning。
“It's all gone. I'm poor again,”he said. “I was a billionaire for five hours。”
This kind of bank error happens frequently. But Mr. Fischer raises an interesting question: What if, for five hours, you truly did have $89 billion?
What would you do with the money? The ground rules are that you would have to give the money back - and whatever you bought or invested with it - after five hours。