{"id":740490,"date":"2026-08-17T05:08:08","date_gmt":"2026-08-17T05:08:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/740490\/"},"modified":"2026-08-17T05:08:08","modified_gmt":"2026-08-17T05:08:08","slug":"ferraris-first-ever-electric-car-sold-for-record-40m-at-auction","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/740490\/","title":{"rendered":"Ferrari’s first ever electric car sold for record $40m at auction"},"content":{"rendered":"

But Ferrari’s shares dropped the day after the Luce’s launch, following backlash over the car.<\/p>\n

Amongst those criticising the car were Italy’s deputy prime minister Matteo Salvini and former Ferrari chairman Luca Cordero di Montezemolo, who said the car was “risking the destruction of a legend”.<\/p>\n

Ferrari’s chief design officer Flavio Manzoni said in an interview in May that critics are part of the innovation process and that he believed people would come to appreciate the Luce.<\/p>\n

The company has not disclosed its target for Luce sales but, according to a Financial Times report, it has hit this year’s goal thanks to strong demand from China.<\/p>\n

Ferrari did not respond to a BBC request for comment on the FT’s report.<\/p>\n

Sotheby’s said in a statement, external<\/a> that the auctioned vehicle marked an “unbeatable opportunity” to own the first production car of the Luce.<\/p>\n

The car has special wheels, customised brakes and a white finish.<\/p>\n

The charity sale marks a “tangible expression of innovation, responsibility, and long-term vision for future generations,” Sotheby’s said.<\/p>\n

Ferraris often attract some of the highest prices at car auctions.<\/p>\n

A bespoke Ferrari Daytona SP3 supercar raised $26m for the carmaker’s education initiatives at an auction in 2025. At the time it set an auction record for the highest-price paid for a new car.<\/p>\n

The current record for the highest price paid at auction was an ultra-rare 1955 Mercedes-Benz 300 SLR Uhlenhaut Coup\u00e9, which was sold for $142m in 2022.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"But Ferrari’s shares dropped the day after the Luce’s launch, following backlash over the car. Amongst those criticising…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":740491,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[84,59,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-740490","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-business","tag-gb","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/740490","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=740490"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/740490\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/740491"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=740490"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=740490"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=740490"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}