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Record for world's priciest bottle of whisky smashed at London auction

The rare bottle had been expected to raise £750,000 to £1.2 million but outstripped estimates
The rare bottle had been expected to raise £750,000 to £1.2 million but outstripped estimates.

A bottle of The Macallan 1926, described by Sotheby's auction house as the "most valuable whisky in the world", on Saturday went under the hammer for a record £2.1 million.

The rare bottle had been expected to raise between £750,000 and £1.2 million but outstripped estimates to fetch £2,187,500 (2.5 million euros, $2.7 million).

The sale set a "new record for any bottle of spirit or sold at auction", Sotheby's told AFP.

One of the Macallan 1926 bottles had set a previous record for the most expensive bottle ever sold in 2019, when it fetched £1.5 million at the same London house.

Sotheby's head of whisky Jonny Fowle told AFP ahead of the sale that he had been allowed to sample the prized whisky.

"I tasted a tiny drop—a tiny drop—of this. It's very rich, it's got a lot of dried fruit as you would expect, a lot of spice, a lot of wood," he said.

He said it had spent 60 years in dark European oak, which was reflected in the color.

"It's not a to take lightly. It's a rich, rich dram, but it is incredible," he said.

The are among only 40 that Macallan, based in Moray, northern Scotland, has confirmed were bottled from Cask 263 in 1986.

© 2023 AFP

Citation: Record for world's priciest bottle of whisky smashed at London auction (2023, November 19) retrieved 7 March 2024 from https://phys.org/news/2023-11-world-priciest-bottle-whisky-london.html
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