Lucky plates prove auction lottery
EXPECTATIONS ran high ahead of Friday's auction of vehicle-registration number HK 1997 - with some speculating that bidding might break the record $13 million paid three years ago for licence plate number 9 - but they came crashing down with the gavel as the plate was withdrawn.
Bidding opened and closed at the reserve price of $2.8 million. Owner Paul Ng Po-keung, who paid $21,000 for the car tag after the signing of the Joint Declaration in 1984, had an agreement with the auctioneer for a much higher bottom line.
If Mr Ng, head of the Nihongo Cultural Centre, had accepted the single bid, he would have realised an annualised yield of about 1,200 per cent.
The auction's failure prompted talk in auction circles that registration numbers - at least those available through private auction - are overpriced. 'If we are talking about $10,000 or $20,000, it may interest the public. But if you're talking about two or three or four million dollars, I think that's a huge amount of money. People will not like to pay,' Aaron Wan Chi-keung, an auctioneer at Associated Auctioneers, said.
Nevertheless, dreams of spectacular returns are enough to make anyone take a second look at his own licence plate. Those who find no auspicious meaning can apply to the Transport Department for the combination of their choice.
Would-be owners pay a $1,000 deposit and wait for their number to come up at one of the twice-monthly public auctions, where they must enter the bidding like anyone else. Mr Ng got his plate at a public auction.
Proceeds go to the Lottery Fund, which distributes funds to local charities. More than $488 million has been raised through the 338 auctions organised by the Transport Department since May 1973.
'We can't compare with those lucky numbers auctioned by the Government because the proceeds go into the community in charity. So people like those,' Mr Wan said.
The Road Traffic Ordinance contains a list of special registration marks deemed lucky or prestigious. These automatically go to auction and normally account for about one-third of the numbers available.
They cannot be transferred and revert to the Government when the owners die or otherwise allow them to lapse. This is what happened to the number 9 plate (the Cantonese word for nine also means long-lasting). Its first owner, billionaire philanthropist Sir Shiu-kin Tang, died in 1986 at the age of 85.
Numbers proposed by members of the public can be transferred, or auctioned privately. Chung Sen Auctioneers, which tried to sell Mr Ng's plate, charges a fee of $10,000 plus 1 per cent of the sale price.
