Although airplanes, jewelry, houses and more were up for bidding, the real stars of the federal government’s “mother of all auctions” on the weekend were seven luxury vehicles that caused a sensation among bidders.
The vehicles had been seized from Héctor “H-1” Ortiz Solares, the leader of a group of hackers, when he was arrested in Guanajuato in May.
The sixth in a series of narco-auctions to sell confiscated goods to fund public works projects, this weekend’s “mega-auction” was expected to bring in 150 million pesos (US $7.9 million), but in the end it earned just 51.6 million pesos (US $2.7 million).
The sales bring the total of funds collected by the auctions to 281.6 million pesos, according to Ricardo Rodríguez Vargas, director of the System of Administrative Allocation of Assets (SAE).
The first car sold on Sunday was a 2018 McLaren 720S coupe, which went for 4.27 million pesos, while the same bidder picked up a 2019 McLaren 600 LT convertible for 3.67 million pesos.
The third car on the block was a 2018 Ferrari 488 Spider convertible with an opening price of 2.98 million pesos. But the winning bidder kicked things off with an initial bid of 4 million pesos and after a heated back and forth with the buyer of the first two cars, took it for 4.9 million.
Next up was a 2019 Lamborghini Huracán coupe, which fetched the highest price of all the vehicles. It was sold for 5.6 million pesos to the bidder who bought the two McLarens.
The remaining cars were a 2019 Aston Martin Vintage AM6, which was sold for 3.24 million pesos; a 2019 Chevrolet Corvette, the least expensive of the vehicles, which sold for 1.62 million pesos; and a 2019 Lamborghini 636 Urus, which went for 5.375 million pesos.
Other objects sold included an 18-karat Piaget white gold watch that failed to sell at the July auction when it had an opening price of 2,953,700 pesos. On Sunday, it sold for the lowered opening price of 1,476,900 pesos.
The nine airplanes up for bidding on Saturday did not sell, but Rodríguez said that some state governments are interested in purchasing them.
Source: El Universal (sp)
