Industry / Watches

Sotheby’s Selling Ultrarare Rolex, Never Seen in Public Before

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Sotheby’s is selling an ultrarare Rolex that, for years, many aficionados believed didn’t exist.

The fourth in a long-rumored series, the 1999 Cosmograph Daytona (Ref. 16516) will be offered at Sotheby’s’ May 11 Important Watches live auction in Geneva. It carries an estimate of $850,000 to $1.7 million.

This timepiece is particularly notable because it’s a specially commissioned Rolex—a rarity for a company that generally shies away from producing private limited editions. But in the late 1990s, the Swiss watch giant manufactured four platinum Daytonas for a private collector.

The watches were “rumored to exist for years but never seen,” Sotheby’s said in a statement. Their legend grew when former Rolex CEO Patrick Heiniger was supposedly spotted wearing one. At the time, Rolex produced Daytonas only in stainless steel, two-tone steel and gold, yellow gold, and white gold. (It eventually began producing platinum Daytonas in 2013.)

Still, the “story was widely branded as entirely apocryphal within the watch community” until Sotheby’s unearthed the first three, it said.

“All three were sold by Sotheby’s way above their initial estimate in 2018, 2020, and 2021,” with the lapis lazuli hardstone dial-model selling for a record $3.2 million in 2020, according to the auction house.

Each of the four limited-edition platinum Daytonas has different dials. The one Sotheby’s will sell in May features a mother-of-pearl dial and diamond hour markers. This will be its first public appearance.

“This exceptional wristwatch which comes for the first time to auction is one of the most elusive and compelling automatic Daytonas ever discovered,” Sotheby said in a statement.

Photo courtesy of Sotheby’s

By: Rob Bates

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