The sale price for the blue diamond was a record for any gemstone sold at auction and also per carat.
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The Hong Kong purchaser promptly renamed it “The Blue Moon of Josephine”, Bennett advised reporters, noting that it had additionally set a world record for any jewel at greater than $ 4 million per carat.
The private Chinese buyer named it the Sweet Josephine following the sale.
Sotheby’s spokesman David Bennett described Wednesday’s Blue Moon diamond as “magical”. Christie’s had listed the proposed sale price at $23m-$28m.
Christie’s auction house will start off a two-day blitz of jewellery sales in Geneva today with an auction headlined by “The Pink”.
It shattered the previous record of “Graff Pink” diamond, which was 24.78 carat and sold by Sotheby’s for USD46.2 million in 2010. Cora global, a New York-based gemcutter, purchased the diamond and took more than six months to prepare the stone. Last year he was convicted in a Macau court on corruption charges and sentenced to more than five years in prison. But Lau, who didn’t attend the trial, has remained free by avoiding travel to the former Portuguese colony, which doesn’t have an extradition treaty with nearby Hong Kong.
A Southby’s employee displays the rare Blue Moon Diamond.
“Weighing in at 12.03 carats, the ‘Blue Moon” diamond is a simply sensational stone of flawless colour and purity, combined with a superb cushion shape.
Francois Curiel, chairman of Christie’s Luxury Group and its veteran jewellery expert, said: “It is absolutely a top price for a stone of this quality, because of its colour”.
This billion-year-old chunk of carbon from Petra Diamonds’ Cullinan mine in South Africa could bag $35 million to $55 million.
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The distinctive blue color in diamonds is attributed to hint quantities of the factor boron within the crystal construction.
