Auctioneers Figures

ONLINE auction giant eBay have announced a record 59 per cent increase in turnover for the first quarter of 2004.

CHRISTIE'S have announced worldwide sales totalling £1.2bn ($2bn) for 2003. This includes auction sales of £1.1bn ($1.8bn) and private sales of £90m ($150m).

SOTHEBY’S have just published their fourth quarter and year-end results for 2003, showing the company to be in a much better financial state than at the end of 2002.

MUNICH-based auctioneers Ketterer Kunst reported “steady growth” in 2003 to post an auction turnover of €15.5m (£10.7m), boosted by the €5.7m Tremmel Collection in May.

Belgian rooms content but no more with 2003 performance: 2003 was a “slightly up-and-down year” for Horta of Brussels, according to firm director Jean-Pierre Julien, but he was satisfied with a four per cent increase in sales from 2002, making it Horta’s most lucrative year since they were founded in 1982.

Brightwells Fine Art, the Leominster based saleroom covering the Marches, Wales and the West Midlands announced their turnover for the year ended December 2003, which, including premium, was £3.16m.

EBAY, the great survivors of the dot-com boom and bust, have again posted a record set of results to complete a remarkable year in which the company reaped revenues of over $2bn. There were 41 million people who have bid, bought or listed on eBay over the past 12 months.

Despite the unpredictable trading conditions of the last 12 months, Tennants posted record trading figures for 2003. Aided by a bumper £1.62m autumn catalogue sale, total sales at The Auction Centre, Leyburn from January to December 2003 were £8.44m (not including premium), a substantial improvement upon the previous year when the North Yorkshire operation posted hammer sales of £7.4m.

Despite a year that saw substantial declines in brown furniture prices and a tailing off in the demand for general silver, most of the UK’s top provincial auctioneers held steady in a difficult market.

SOTHEBY’S chief executive Bill Ruprecht is bullish about the company’s second quarter performance, reporting a 25 per cent increase in net income on the same period last year.

eBay have reported a record $266.3m turnover for the second quarter of the year ending June 30, a 47 per cent increase on the same period last year. Of this, $235.3m came from online transactions.

Sales by members of the Paris Compagnie des Commissaires-Priseurs (i.e. all Paris auctioneers bar Christie’s and Sotheby’s) fell 15 per cent in the first half of 2002 to €290m (£187m), as compared to the first six months of 2001.

SOTHEBY’S results for the first quarter of 2002 show a 20 per cent drop in revenues – no great surprise following September 11 and smaller London Impressionist and Contemporary sales.

FRANCE: Paris auction house Drouot reported a slight rise of 0.66 per cent in 2001 turnover to Fr4.11bn (£391m). Art sales rose five per cent to Fr3.47bn (£330m).

Sotheby’s have instigated a dramatic ‘restructure’ of their company after announcing net losses of $183m for the first nine months of this year.

FRANCE: Sales rose 19.5 per cent at Drouot in Paris, to Fr1.965 billion (excluding premium), in the first six months of 2000, compared with the same period in 1999.

SALES figures for the first half of 2000 were up by more than a fifth at Christie’s.

SOTHEBY’S profits fell 5.2 per cent for the second quarter of 2000, against the same period last year, despite revenue rising. The company largely blames Internet expenses and the $3.8m costs of the anti-trust investigation for this drop.

UK: LONDON-based auctioneers PHILLIPS’ bid to join Sotheby’s and Christie’s in the premier league of the auction world appears to be making some progress as they reported a 48 per cent increase in hammer sales for their London rooms for January to July this year.

UK: TURNOVER figures posted by provincial auctioneers for the year January to December 1999 revealed a turnaround in the positions of the top two firms.