[Caitlin]

I just thought of this. You should try to determine a per carat price for it- as they do for abalone pearls.

Now don't ask me how to do the research, but obviously you really need to do research.

We have 2 natural pearl buyers who read and sometimes contribute to this forum: both are honest and knowledgeable. Jeremy Norris and Wes Rankin. I think Jeremy posts undder jnorris and Wes under Pacific pearl something.

Good luck

[pernula]

The largest Melo pearl and the pearl in Ken's pictures both look beautiful. I wish your Thai family and the fishermen good luck.

I just have a few comments about the story of the $5 to $7 million offer. It may well be true but something is nagging me about it. Like the Pearl of Allah, someone supposedly made an offer for it. It wasn't actually appraised or documented to have sold for that amount. Circulation of the story of the offer benefits the current owner, but not really anyone else.

Also, I find it hard to believe a vice president of Sotheby made a private offer for it. Auction houses have legal responsibilities both to the sellers and buyers. If you decide to use auction houses, you don't want to feel uneasy that employees of those auction houses are eyeing your items and trying to make private deals with you. How can you be sure then that there is no conflict of interest? Most large companies will have policies in place against such conflict of interest.

Just my two cents.

Regards,
pernula

[Caitlin]

The Pearl of Allah (PoA) was first marketed in 1939 at $3.5 million with no takers. When it finally did sell in 1980, it was for $200,000- far less than 10% of the asking price. If I did the math right that should tell us something.

keystone price X10? Is that how you say that?

Since then there have been several updated "appraisals" and lots of press releases about huge offers not accepted, but the truth is that even when the court ordered it sold in 1990 to pay back an investor, it did not sell at all, so a 1/3 owner/investor's children are still waiting for the most recent court ordered buy-out to happen- let alone a return on the original investment. At this point it has traded hands only once since 1939, in spite of the fact it has been up for sale continously since 1939.

Stay tuned for the full story on the PoA. There is more than one lesson to be learned from it.

[GemGeek]

I sent this page link to Pala International, which was previously mentioned. They cater to collectors of fine gem specimens. They may be interested, or may have some good advice. Maybe Bill would want it for his personal collection.

[kenneth.thorman]

Hi

First of all I would like to thank everyone for your interest and your replies. When I initially was looking for a place to post this I had no idea where to post and just did a search on Google for "pearl expert". This site came up and it seemed like a good fit. I guess I got lucky . I did not expect this post to actually spark much of an interest but I was wrong.

Just to give you an update on what I have been doing.

I have sent an email to both Christies and Sotheby's asking for their guidance if there would be any possibility of selling this pearl. I am still awaiting a reply from Sotheby's whereas Christies have replied back requesting that the images be attached to an email due to them being unable to view images from websites. This is my next step.

I have also with a reference to Valeria101's post #10 I have contacted Pala International, MeloPearls.com as well as tried to get into touch with Vincent Pardieu from the Gubelin Gem Lab. I have not received any replies yet.

I am sorry for not posting this progress before as I can see you all have been very helpful and one have even contacted Pala International on my behalf (thank you very much), but my connection has been playing up (again ).

Even though my initial hope was that this would not be a complicated sale (I was sceptically about the price from the start though) so I would not have to spend much time on this, it have shown to be rather interesting and I am learning a lot in the progress. All in all thank you for introducing me to the world of pearls in encouraging way. You have all been most helpfull.

Regards
Ken

[kenneth.thorman]

Just to keep you updated.

One of the 3 companies I have contacted has just replied back indicating that around ½ of the suggested selling price would be more common in trading, meaning somewhere between 80.000$-100.000$ and that 200.000 probably is too high. I personally consider that a high price indeed but it is not what the Thai owner hoped for. I guess I will have to contact him/them and see if they are interested in a somewhat lower price.

There seem to be very different opinions about what a pearl like this "normally" costs. Some have indicated that 200.000 is like 10 times the "normal" price.

So the price range seems to be from 20.000$ - 100.000$ which is not bad at all. This just confirms what some allready have posted here. There is no real standard price for a pearl like this.

Regards
Ken

[jshepherd]

There are so many factors that go into it. The size and quality are important, of course. But the fact that it is in Thailand ads another difficult element. In order to get someone over there for a single piece, it really has to be tempting. It is just too risky and difficult. The size is not "huge" although it is a big pearl. It appears to have flame in the photo, but I cannot tell how intense it is.

Regarding the price in "trading", this would still be a lot more than the seller in Thailand could hope to achieve, even if the value were there. Trading prices between dealers and the actual source cost is different. He would really need to be over here shopping it around, or get lucky with a trader already over there.