【Hong Kong】World’s Largest… 15-Carat ‘Blue Diamond’ Fetches Staggering Auction Price

The world’s largest blue diamond has been sold at auction for a final hammer price of 73.2 billion won. This marks the first time a blue diamond exceeding 15 carats has ever been offered at auction.

According to CNN on the 28th (local time), global auction house Sotheby’s announced the previous day that the 15.10-carat ‘De Beers Cullinan Blue’ diamond was sold for HK$405.92 million (approximately 73.2 billion won) in Hong Kong. Discovered last year at the Cullinan mine in South Africa, the De Beers Cullinan Blue is recorded as the world’s largest blue diamond.

Sotheby’s assessed this diamond as exceptionally rare, noting that blue diamonds over 10 carats have appeared at auction only five times before. According to Bloomberg, colored diamonds are rarer than white diamonds, and among them, blue diamonds, which are particularly difficult to mine, are among the rarest.

This diamond received the ‘Fancy Vivid Blue’ grade from the Gemological Institute of America (GIA), the highest classification for colored diamonds. This is a grade awarded to less than 1% of blue diamonds submitted to the institute.

The final hammer price significantly exceeded the initial estimate of $48 million (approximately 61.1 billion won).

However, it fell just short of the recorded all-time highest auction price for a blue diamond. The record title is still held by the 14.62-carat ‘Oppenheimer Blue’. The Oppenheimer Blue was sold for $57,541,779 (approximately 73.3 billion won) in 2016, a difference of less than 100 million won from this latest sale price.