For a while now, classic cars, like other auction markets have been going up, up, up. But has an end been reached. A 1963 Ferrari 250 GT SWB California Spyder was expected to be a big seller at the Automobiles of London event held by RM Auctions and comprehensively delineated by my colleague Jared Paul Stern earlier this month.
After all the red beauty is one of the last three short-wheel-base examples of the 250 GT California Spyder built and is was driven by Cameron Diaz in a ``Charlie's Angels'' movie. It had a presale estimate of 3 million pounds ($5 million) and as Bloomberg reports it didn't sell. The sale, which was held in association with Sotheby's, raised 14.7 million pounds way short of the low estimate of 20 million and also off of the 18 million pounds the sale earned last year.
Right after the ``Charlie's Angels'' Spyder failed to sell a silver 1997 McLaren F1 sports car sold for 2.5 million pounds, more than double its 1.1 million-pound low estimate. Overall though the news wasn't promising and 30 percent of the 129 lots were unsold. The auction house had asked some consignors before the sale to cut the reserve prices on their lots, predicting a poor sale to the economy. Some agreed to make an adjustment. Another item in the sale, a blue 1955 Ford Thunderbird, once owned by Hollywood actor John Travolta, who starred in the 1950s-inspired movie ``Grease,'' sold for 18,700 pounds against expectations of 20,000 pounds-to-30,000 pounds.
