According to Sotheby’s, a 1962 Ferrari 250 GTO sports car went for $51.7 million on Monday in New York, making it the second most expensive vehicle ever to be sold at auction.
The auction house stated that the Mercedes 300 SLR Uhlenhaut Coupe, which sold for 135 million euros in 2022, was the only vehicle to surpass the auction price of the bright red roadster, which had been owned by an American collector for the previous 38 years. At the current currency rate, that would be $144 million.
After a brief period of bidding in the auction room on Monday evening, the 250 GTO was put up for sale, albeit it didn’t get the more than $60 million that the auction house’s luxury automobile affiliate, RM Sotheby’s, had anticipated. Sotheby’s did not identify the winning bidder.
Dating from 1962, this legendary Scuderia sports car chassis 3765, four-liter engine developing 390 horsepower had finished second in a 1,000 km endurance race on the German Nurburgring circuit, as well as in the legendary 24 Hours of Le Mans, where the team had to withdraw due to engine failure, according to RM Sotheby’s.
The vehicle was sold and sent to the US in the late 1960s following several years of competition in Sicily and on the Italian mainland.
After being modified and restored, the 250 GTO had multiple American owners before being acquired by a “dedicated collector” in Ohio in 1985, who then sold it on Monday.
“This stunning GTO offers its next caretaker further touring and vintage racing enjoyment, or display at major concours d’elegance and marque gatherings worldwide,” Sotheby’s said.
The Mercedes 300 SLR Uhlenhaut Coupe that fetched 135 million euros in 2022 was one of only two examples of the sport car. It sold at a confidential auction at the German manufacturer’s museum in Stuttgart and was the most expensive car ever sold worldwide, whether at auction or privately, a RM Sotheby’s spokesman told AFP.
The auction houses Sotheby’s and Christie’s in New York wrap up their fall art auctions this week. Despite the economic downturn, these sales have brought in hundreds of millions of dollars.
Despite a tough geopolitical setting, Sotheby’s claims that the market, which is driven by China and Asia, is growing and doesn’t seem to be slowing down.
“Whatever happens in the financial markets, a car of this caliber is a collector’s item, a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity,” Michael Caimano of RM Sotheby’s told AFP before the sale, comparing the Ferrari to a work of art that “can be touched, felt and heard.”
