A car license plate with a highly sought-after sequence of numbers has been sold for NT$661,000 (US$22,800), Taipei City Motor Vehicle Office said on Wednesday.
The license plate, “AAA-9999,” was sold at a public auction on Monday.
For Taiwanese, the number “99” is considered to be good luck because it sounds like jiu jiu (久久) in Mandarin, which means longevity.
In April last year, license plate “8888-88” was sold for NT$3.5 million.
It was considered a “super plate” because the character ba (八) — eight in Mandarin — sounds similar to fa (發, prosperity) and it is therefore considered highly auspicious.
Yeh Shih-sheng (葉士坤), a senior technician at the Taipei City Motor Vehicle Office, said the AAA-9999 license plate had received 68 bids.
According to Motor Vehicle Office officials, the winning bidder must settle the bid within 24 hours, and when that is done the license plate can be collected within three months.
If the license plate is not picked up before the three-month deadline expires, it will not be re-auctioned unless it was a misplaced bid, in which case a new auction would be held.
Last month at an auction held by the Taipei City Motor Vehicle Office, the AAA-9999 license plate received a bid of NT$6 million.
However, the bidder did not subsequently pay for the plate.
Meanwhile, on Wednesday, license plate “AAC-8888” received the highest bid among plates starting with AAC, with a winning bid of NT$92,000, while the plate “AAC-9999” fetched NT$7,000, only NT$1,000 higher than its opening bid, Taipei City Motor Vehicle Office officials said.
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