Page 63 - Classics Issue

The ffth car belongs to Santa Barbara communications billionaire Craig McCaw. He paid a record-breaking price for his car in 2013 of $35 million. His Brother Bruce owns one as well.A sixth GTO belongs to Ed Davies of Coral Gables Florida. Ed and Leslie Davies are another pair of slightly mysterious GTO owners. They are frequently seen at car events dressed very casually as if they just came from the beach. At a Florida car rally, a reporter managed to track Ed down for a very brief interview. When asked what he did for a living, Ed replied “Not much of anything.” Their collection includes a 1957 Ferrari Testa Rossa, a 290 MM, a black Enzo, an F50 and many more. The Davies acquired their 250 GTO in 1994 for an unknown price. The seventh car, owned by John Shirley another Microsoft multi-millionaire, was purchased in1998 for $6 million. Another software billionaire and owner of a GTO is Anthony Wang part owner with his brother of CA technologies which today apparently has annual revenues of $4.5 Billion. At one point he and his wife had two GTOs however one was sold to Rob Walton.A ninth car in the USA belongs to John Mozart, one of the most discerning car collectors in the world. His fortune was founded when he sold his business Eurasian Automotive to SKF bearings. He used the money to go into the real estate development business and has done incredibly well. He now has a collection of very signifcant cars. `Possibly over a 100. He purchased his GTO in 1998.The tenth car in America belongs to Charles Nearburg of Dallas Texas. The owner of Nearburg Exploration an oil and Gas Company. His car is very dear to my heart as `I once owned it only to sell it stupidly to Tom Price in the early seventy’s for around $200,000. The eleventh car is in the Ralph Lauren collection. He purchased the car in 1985 for $650,000. As it is now probably worth $60 million, a hundred fold return, even if he is apparently worth $8 billion this must be one of his better investments. Car number twelve belongs to Peter Sachs, the lead partner in Goldman Sachs Bank. Another savvy investor who owns many important Ferrari’s. Car thirteen is owned by Chip Connor of Incline Village Nevada. Another billionaire whose wealth comes from business activities in Hong Kong. His car is arguably one of the very best GTOs never having been crashed or modifed in any way. He acquired the car in 2000 for a rumoured $9 million. The fourteenth car belongs to the only car dealer-collector Tom Price. Tom to whom I sold his frst GTO mentioned above has many car dealerships in northern California and is possibly the world’s largest Tesla dealer. The last car in America I have kept till last, as it is the car with the longest single ownership. James McNeil having bought it for under $5,000 in 1967. He is also the only GTO owner that is not incredibly rich.Remaining there are three cars. One in Canada belonging to Lawrence Stroll, truly a fashion mogul. Forbes put his wealth at about $4 billion. His most famous brand name is Tommy Hilfger. His son Lance is currently racing cars for the Williams team in Formula 1. I wish him better luck in rest of the season.A second car was purchased for $32 million in 2012 by Carlos Hank Rhon, the owner of the huge Mexican fnancial group Financiero Interacciones.