An exceptionally-rare blue diamond went beneath the hammer in Geneva late Tuesday, selling for $21.5 million, Sotheby’s public sale residence talked about.
“The Mediterranean Blue”, a elaborate vivid blue diamond weighing 10.3 carats with an estimated price of $20 million, attracted an intense bidding battle.
Bidding began at 9 million Swiss francs ($10.8 million), with a fierce forwards and backwards sooner than the diamond was in the long run supplied to a personal US collector, whose title was not given, for 17.9 million francs ($21.5 million), Sotheby’s talked about.
The Mediterranean Blue, which is a brand-new blue diamond simply currently mined from the legendary Cullinan mines of South Africa, generated giant pleasure contained in the diamond enterprise ever as a result of it was first launched in March, the general public sale residence talked about.
Ahead of its final exhibiting in Geneva on Tuesday, it was unveiled as part of a Sotheby’s debut exhibition in Abu Dhabi ultimate month, the place it was showcased alongside seven completely different “extraordinary” diamonds and gems collectively value over $100 million.
“On the prime of the rarity pyramid are blue diamonds,” Quig Bruning, head of jewels for Sotheby’s in North America, Europe and the Middle East, talked about on the Abu Dhabi current.
After serving as auctioneer at Tuesday’s event, he hailed the gem as “undoubtedly the defining stone of the season”, saying in an announcement that it “ranks among the many many prime blue diamonds now we now have supplied”.
Tobias Kormind, head of Europe’s largest on-line diamond jeweller 77 Diamonds, was a lot much less upbeat, describing the sale as “a lot much less dazzling than anticipated”.
“The diamond did exceed its $20 million estimate, suggesting there was important curiosity,” he acknowledged.
“Nevertheless broader uncertainty, along with the continued US-China commerce tensions, may have dampened bidder confidence and muted what might have been a additional frenzied atmosphere.”
This story was initially featured on Fortune.com
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