That Auction Record-Breaking 1962 Ferrari 250 GTO Is Worth More Than Its Weight In Gold

That Auction Record-Breaking 1962 Ferrari 250 GTO Is Worth More Than Its Weight In Gold

This past winter, the world saw a 1962 Ferrari 250 GTO sell at RM Sotheby’s Monterey Car Week for a staggering $US48.4 ($67) million — making it the most expensive car ever sold at auction. Know what else is disgusting? This makes the Ferrari officially worth more than its weight in gold.

This little fact was first pointed out by Reddit user LegoLeprechaun in the r/cars subreddit. He wrote:

The current gold price is $1237.48 [$AUD1711] per ounce, which translates to $US39.78 [$AUD55] per gram.

In [August] this year, a Ferrari 250 GTO sold for $48,405,000 [$AUD66,938,742], which makes it the most expensive car in history, period. For this you get 880kg of the most special car in automotive history. This equals to $55.00 [$AUD76] per gram — 1.4 times its weight in gold.

We have now reached the point where a car is worth more than its weight in gold, and not even just by a tiny margin. I just thought that this was pretty interesting.

Of course, I wanted to run the numbers, too, just for fun. At the time of this writing, the price of one kilo of gold is $US39,899.08 ($55,176), according to Money Metals. Ferrari reports that the 250 GTO has a dry weight of 880kg.

The Ferrari’s weight in gold, therefore, is $US35 ($48) million. It sold for over $US13 ($18) million more than that. Jesus, man! If I break off a piece of the fender and sell it, then I could buy my Viper.

Can you imagine if we sold cars by weight? Lotuses would quickly become the cheapest cars, McLarens would be commonplace and EVs, hybrids and SUVs would only be for the ultra rich.

The only car I can bring to mind at the moment that sold for almost a dollar per pound is a 1970 Honda N600. Weighing in at about 590kg, it sold for about $US1500 ($2074).

Me? I’ll take a gold Trans Am.


The Cheapest NBN 50 Plans

It’s the most popular NBN speed in Australia for a reason. Here are the cheapest plans available.

At Gizmodo, we independently select and write about stuff we love and think you'll like too. We have affiliate and advertising partnerships, which means we may collect a share of sales or other compensation from the links on this page. BTW – prices are accurate and items in stock at the time of posting.