After four days of moving $450 million worth of metal masterpieces in Monterey, what we now know is that realism has finally hit the middle range of the mega auction market.
While there were some records set, just 10 cars accounted for nearly 40 per cent of the total sales. Five of those were 1950s Ferraris and 45 per cent of the cars offered by the five auction houses were not sold. Bottom line is, in US dollars, values of all but the very best cars are going down and sellers need to get realistic if they are going to sell at auction.
In the Ferrari department, Dave Gooding got away a 1959 250 GT California LWB Alloy Spider for $24m (or the price of a one bedder with sunroom at Bondi), a 1960 250 GT SWB Competizione Coupe for $18m and a 1950 Ferrari 166 MM Berlinetta for $7m. But sale of the century and a salve to the former greatness of not so Great Britain was the 1955 Jaguar D-Type Roadster, which crossed the block for $28.5m, a record for a British automobile at auction. The 1956 Le Mans-winning D-Type, probably the most important Jaguar ever made, had four punters ferociously bidding for 15 minutes.
Then RM Sotheby’s took the highest price for an American car (which you could argue could also be British), the very first Shelby Cobra, which at $18m was a record high for a Yank tank. Carroll Shelby built and kept this car from new. He stopped driving it when he died which was probably a good thing. But it wasn’t all WASPs last weekend. RM sold a 1939 Alfa Romeo 8C 2900B Lungo Spider for a record price, $19.8m.
Just imagine you’re living la dolce vita in Rome in 1939. Mr Chamberlain believes he has engineered a settlement between France and Italy. Ben Mussolini is in charge. To demonstrate how good fascists were for the place, Ben put a lot of emphasis on technological achievement. Italy had the world’s fastest ocean liner, the fastest sea plane and the fastest and most beautiful cars. The pinnacle was the Alfa Lungo Spider. Alfa made just seven of them and at $2230, they were the most expensive car you could buy.
You would be Luigi the Lad sitting behind the wheel of your Spider driving along the Via Condotti. In front of you is a 2905cc, twin-supercharged eight-cylinder engine developed from Alfa’s racing engines, pumping out an enormous 135kW that’s good for 177km/h. Now if that doesn’t make you feel like forking out $26m, what would?
Dave Gooding’s top seller was also an Alfa. The 1933 Alfa Romeo 8C 2300 Monza Roadster was not only the most successful and technically advanced sports car of its time, but super racer Renato Balestrero won the 1947 Italian National Sports Car Championship in this one, 14 years after it was built. You could have had it for $16m. On the other hand, Maseratis underperformed, except for the 2005 MC-12 that, as we predicted, sold for $1.8m. RM sold a heap of other Maseratis, in not great condition, very cheaply.
Talking cheap cars, you could buy just about any MGB at any auction in Monterey for $7000.
It really was an Italian year at Monterey. Up on the 18th fairway of the Pebble Beach Golf Course, a 1936 Lancia Astura Pinin Farina Cabriolet took out the 2016 Concours d’Elegance. About to be sent to the scrap heap in 1962, the car was instead sent back to Pinin Farina for a rebuild. Eric Clapton owned it, “the most fun I’ve had off stage and out of bed” and current owner Richard Mattei spent six years restoring it and drove away with three Pebble Beach awards.
Moving to German cars, The Wall Street Journal this week said that “from Australia to South Korea to Ireland, governments and consumers are ratcheting up legal and regulatory demands in part because such moves in the US yielded a speedy shift to contrition from combativeness”. Of course if you subscribe to The Australian we throw in free access to the WSJ. What a deal!
“In many of the countries where Volkswagen still faces legal action, it is arguing the so-called defeat device on its diesel engines wasn’t illegal or the car emissions didn’t violate local rules, according to court records and documents reviewed by The Wall Street Journal.” Yup that’s what VW is doing in Australia.
Moving on to The Confederation of Australian Motor Sport. We had a heated conversation with CEO Eugene Arocca. The take home messages were: This is a shortened version. Read the complete article at: http://www.theaustralian.com.au/life/motoring/monterey-deals-midrange-sellers-a-sobering-dose-of-reality/news-story/0abdd39a424e383e299b3182da9af327
