Even in a flagging economy, Christie’s auction house in New York City was able to attract a record sales price for a photograph.
In November, a 1999 photo by German artist Andreas Gursky, of a scenic view of the Rhine River, sold for $4.3 million.
It is possible, of course, that buying the actual waterfront property that Gursky photographed from — to enjoy the same view every day — would have been less expensive.
It’s cold
up there
in the north
Unfortunately, Manulife Financial Corp. is a Canadian firm, and thus it had a very bad year.
If exactly the same company had been magically relocated to anywhere in the United States, it would have had an outstanding year.
Under Canada’s hard-nosed accounting rules, Manulife was forced to post a loss last year of $1.28 billion. However, under the more feel-good U.S. accounting rules, according to the company, it would have shown a profit of $2.2 billion and been flush with $16 billion more in shareholder value.
(Send your Weird News to Chuck Shepherd, P.O. Box 18737, Tampa Fla. 33679 or go to www.newsoftheweird.com.)