The international auction houses Christie's, Sotheby's and Phillips are rather cautious about their half-yearly figures. After the difficult year 2020, they also prefer the first half of 2019 for comparison, which makes sense if one wants to study the recovery of the market. Profits after deduction of costs are not disclosed by the all privately owned companies. The costs were considerable, after investments in the online presence and the online offer, plus temporary pop-up sales exhibitions from Aspen to Long Island and Palm Beach to Monte Carlo. Sotheby's also has a new auction location in Cologne and moves into new premises in Los Angeles. Christie's announced plans for a new headquarters in a Hong Kong skyscraper designed by Zaha Hadid Architects from 2024.With the increasing number of sales exhibitions, the proportion of
private sales
on total sales - and the encroachment on the traditional territory of the art trade. The auction houses are already advising their customers on setting up and managing collections. Above all, Sotheby's is looking to collaborate with galleries and dealers, which can not only help with the replenishment of material from up-and-coming artists in auctions.
Sales at Christie's, Sotheby's and Phillips recovered significantly from the 2020 slump in the first half of the year. According to the art market research company ArtTactic, in the first half of 2021 the three companies together generated sales of 5.9 billion dollars worldwide through auctions alone: slightly above the 5.7 billion dollars in 2019; in the first half of 2020 it was 1.79 billion. Phillips reported his own auction sales himself, albeit calculated into July, the end of the spring season: $ 452 million, an increase of fifteen percent over 2019 and more than four times as much as 2020. Sotheby's and Christie's did not announce any sales. But according to ArtTactic's calculations, Sotheby's earned around $ 2.84 billion from auctions in the first half of 2021 alone, more than double the 1,2 billion in the same period of 2020. For Christie's, ArtTactic estimates auction sales in the first half of the year at $ 2.64 billion, compared to $ 481 million between January and June 2020 (excluding the large hybrid auction in July).
As far as total sales are concerned, this also includes privately mediated sales and other services in addition to auctions. Christie's announced total first half sales of $ 3.5 billion; this is the second-best half-year result within six years and an increase of thirteen percent compared to 2019. For comparison: In the entire pandemic year of 2020, Christie's turned over $ 4.4 billion. Phillips reported total sales of $ 542.7 million for the first half of its auction year, an increase of 25 percent compared to 2019. Phillips is particularly successful with the watches division, all of which were on offer for the first half of the year with a total value of $ 68 million were sold. Sotheby's does not want to publish its sales figures for 2021 until the end of the year.