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The Most Expensive Artworks in the World are Often Sold Behind Closed Doors. Here's What’s Happening.
Last year, a Van Gogh painting reportedly sold for $200 million. A Rothko for $195 million. A Frida Kahlo for $150 million. None of these transactions are in auction records or any public database.
For years, top auction houses like Sotheby’s and Christie’s have been quietly running invitation-only private auctions for their wealthiest clients.
These huge transactions don't happen in a vacuum. This invisible market often influences the asking range for comparable works in the larger art market.
That said, you don't need an invite to a private auction. Masterworks lets you invest in shares of blue-chip artwork. Their track record to-date:
$1.3B deployed across 525+ artworks by 70,000 members
29 sales to date
Net annualized returns like 16.5%, 17.6%, and 17.8%, not including those unsold*
*Investing involves risk. Past performance is not indicative of future returns. See important Reg A disclosures at masterworks.com/cd.
② One strategy in this book returned 2.3× the S&P 500 on a risk-adjusted basis over 5 years.
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A filtered universe of correlated Nasdaq-100 stocks
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Contents:
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