The purchase of a Rolex Monoblocco watch by the swindler Bernard Madoff was a prescient one. The vintage timepiece is also known as the Prisoner’s Watch, because Hans Wilsdorf, Rolex’s owner, sold the watches on credit to British prisoners of war during the Second World War, allowing them to pay when the war was over.
Now that Madoff is doing time of a different sort — 150 years at Butner Federal Correctional Complex in North Carolina — a lifetime of valuables that he and his wife, Ruth, collected will be auctioned on Saturday in New York to raise money for victims of his $65 billion (£40 billion) Ponzi scheme.
The Monoblocco is expected to fetch as much as $87,500, while Mrs Madoff’s antique diamond earings could reach $21,400, according to estimates by Gaston & Sheehan, the Texan auctioneers running the sale at the New York Sheraton.
Buyers with less cash but a hankering for a piece of Wall Street history could snap up a set of Bernard L Madoff Investment Securities stationery, including personalised Post-it Notes, for between $90 and $100.
A set of three T-shirts with the insignia of Madoff’s yacht, Bull, is expected to go for $150 to $210.
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A spokeswoman for Gaston & Sheehan said the auctioneers expected a full house at the Sheraton, where about 75 lots will be disposed of each hour. “We’ve had a lot of interest in the auction and it’s very widespread, across all the goods,” she said.