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Racingdeal Newsletter
Monday, January 12, 2009
Racingdeal.com - The Top 10 Million Dollar Sellers of 2008
And what a year it was. Looking at the auction results we have to come to the conclusion, that the market is still going very strong despite the fact, that Wall Street was in shock in 2008.
50% out of 10 top sellers of last year were sold by RM Auctions and another third by Bonhams, Gooding came in third. The performance of these three auction houses was definitely top notch. More than half of the automobiles were sold in Pebble Beach, Monterey or Carmel, California and more than 25% were sold in Maranello, Italy. All in the months of May and August 2008. Apparently there were investors running from one place to the other to find the perfect pick. No wonder, that 5 out of 10 Top sellers were Ferraris.
The top seller was a 1961 Ferrari 250 GT California for 10.894.400 US Dollars, auctioned by RM Auctions in Maranello in May 2008. An unbelievable amount of money for an unbelievable automobile!
The runner ups were the following dreamcars:
1937 Bugatti 57SC - 7.920.000 US Dollar
Gooding - Pebble Beach
1964 Ferrari 250 LM - 6.979.225 US Dollar
RM - Maranello
1960 Jaguar E 2A - 4.957.000 US Dollar
Bonhams - Carmel
1939 Talbot Lago - 4.847.000 US Dollar
Bonhams - Carmel
1961 Ferrari 250 GT - 4.510.000 US Dollar
RM - Monterrey
1955 Jaguar D Type - 4.378.343 US Dollar
Bonhams - Sussex
1997 McLaren F1 - 4.058.120 US Dollar
RM - London
1958 Ferrari 250 Calif - 3.659.838 US Dollar
RM - Monterrey
1959 Ferrari 250 GT - 3.630.000 US Dollar
Gooding - Pebble Beach
This just to give you a short glimpse at what happened in 2008.
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The British gent who purchased the Cal Spyder for a reported 10.8 million US dollars likely did so using british pounds, at a time when 1 pound equaled USD 2. If so, he paid about 5.4 million pounds. Were he to make that same purchase today it would now be valued at about USD 7.7 million, with the pound currently about USD 1.42. The same buyer purchased the 250 GT SWB for the equivalent of USD 4.5 million, or 2.25 million pounds, last August. At today's exchange rates, that purchase would be USD 3.2 million. The implication is Ferrari values have dropped 30% in the past year. Most of the cars listed above were likely purchased with home/ functional currencies denominated in pounds or euros, so we can attribute a large degree of the perceived escalation in prices during 2008 to the severe erosion of the US dollar during that period. Now that USD has strenghtened in the past few months against most major currencies, we should expect a softening of prices in USD terms. I do not envision any big numbers at this year's auctions, at least in USD denominations. To gain a clear understanding of the inherent values of the underlying assets, one must attempt to isolate the distortions caused by currency fluctuations. I'm just saying...
Cheers
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