Fugitive Hong Kong tycoon Joseph Lau makes HK$64 million after auctioning off 414 wines at Christie’s
- Joseph Lau says he originally bought famous wines for total of HK$10 million
- Fugitive tycoon will also auction off portfolio of Chinese imperial porcelain valued at up to HK$151 million on April 29
Fugitive Hong Kong tycoon Joseph Lau Luen-hung has made a more than fivefold profit after selling off his collection of famous wines through a British auction house for HK$64 million (US$8.1 million).
The 70-year-old revealed on Thursday that he sold 414 wines the day before at auctioneer Christie’s, having originally bought the collection for a total of HK$10 million. Half of the buyers were mainland Chinese, while others were from Taiwan and Hong Kong.
Lau noted in a statement that he had been buying different vintages for more than 40 years. When he first started his collection, he purchased white and red bottles of wine “purely for entertainment and purely to do business with Americans”.
The tycoon said he often kept at least 40 to 50 famous wines on hand for his friends at parties, adding that some drank it “as fast as water”, prompting him to buy multiple batches of notable ones at auctions and store them in his warehouses for the drink.
He became more adept at bidding for rare bottles as his knowledge of red wine grew, according to the statement.
Lau is active in this year’s spring auction with both Christie’s and Sotheby’s auction houses. He is set to put on sale a portfolio of Chinese imperial porcelain valued up to HK$151 million through Sotheby’s on April 29, after suffering losses in stock market investments.
According to market sources, the portfolio accounted for a fraction of Lau’s collection that included antique porcelain and furniture, paintings, sculptures, gemstones and wine he had amassed since 1978 when he was 27.
The eight pieces of Chinese imperial porcelain originating from the Ming and Qing dynasties were each valued between HK$1.5 million and HK$65 million, according to Sotheby’s Asia chairman Nicholas Chow.
Lau and the family-controlled developer Chinese Estates Holdings incurred financial losses worth billions of Hong Kong dollars from the sale of China Evergrande shares and bonds last year.
Fugitive Hong Kong tycoon to auction off HK$151 million worth of porcelain
Chinese Estates divested more than 630 million China Evergrande shares, resulting in a loss of HK$7.9 billion, amid the liquidity and debt crisis of the mainland developer last year.
Lau made headlines in 2020 after selling David Hockney’s The Splash at Sotheby’s contemporary art sale in London for £23.1 million (US$29.4 million at that time), the third-highest price ever achieved at an auction for a piece by the British pop art painter.
In November 2015, Lau bought a 12-carat blue diamond for US$49 million, also at a Sotheby’s auction, breaking the world record for a gemstone sold at an auction.
Lau is ranked sixth among Hong Kong’s 50 richest this year, with a net worth of US$13.6 billion as of Tuesday, according to Forbes.
The tycoon was convicted of bribery and money laundering in absentia by a Macau court in 2014, but avoided a five-year jail term by not travelling there.
