In a Hurry to Put His Bad Deals Behind Him, Rybolovlev Sells at a Loss

The Rybolovlev-Bouvier blood feud won’t go away as Katya Kazakina details Rybolovlev’s disposal of his art collection. Bloomberg’s reporter remarks upon the attractive estimates Christie’s has put on the art works which provokes this response from the Russian’s representatives:

“The gulf between Christie’s estimates and the original purchase prices of the works is a further illustration of the unprecedented scale and audacity of the fraud that the plaintiffs allege was perpetrated by Mr. Bouvier,” Sergey Chernitsyn, a representative of the Rybolovlev Family Office, said in an e-mailed statement.

That may be the case but it is unclear why Ryboloblev is so eager to advertise his market malpractice. The upcoming sales in London have the fertilizer liquidating a substantial number of works. It looks like Christie’s is estimating the works aggressively to attract buyers; however, at these estimates bidders will have to go to war on all the works to make Rybolovlev close to whole: 

“Joueur de flute et femme nue” (1970) by Pablo Picasso
Bought: $35 million
Christie’s estimate: $8.1 million-$10.6 million

“Le baiser, grand modèle” (original conceived circa 1882-1889,
cast in 2010) by Auguste Rodin
Bought: $10.4 million
Christie’s estimate: $4.9 million-$7.5 million

“Te Fare (La Maison)” (1892) by Paul Gauguin
Bought: $85 million
Christie’s estimate: $15 million-$22.4 million

“No. 1” (1949) by Mark Rothko 
Bought: $36 million
Christie’s estimate: $10 million-$15 million

“Le domaine d’Arnheim” (1938) by René Magritte
Bought: $43.5 million
Christie’s estimate: $8.1 million-$10.6 million

It isn’t clear what accounts for the hurry to sell. Rybolovlev may have overpaid but the value of his art can only catch up to the prices he paid through the mechanism of time. Selling now, won’t undo the financial damage as demonstrated by the recent sales that Kazakina chronicles:

Two Rybolovlev trusts in the British Virgin Islands recouped “less than $50 million” when the Russian sold Paul Gauguin’s “Otahi,” according to court papers they filed in New York. That’s about 60 percent below the $120 million Rybolovlev paid. In November 2015, he sold Gustav Klimt’s “Wasserschlangen II” for $170 million, down from the $183.8 million purchase price. In May 2016, his Auguste Rodin sculpture, “L’Eternel Printemps,” fetched $20.4 million, an auction record for the artist but less than a half the $48.1 million he paid.