The extraordinarily wealthy have always been interested in luxuries: limited-edition sports cars, bottles of wine once owned by various Founding Fathers, perhaps the occasional Rothko. But one investment in particular, 66 million years old, has seen its popularity skyrocket among super-rich buyers, proving that millionaires truly do move in herds.
The price of dinosaur fossils sold at private auctions has skyrocketed since 1997, when a Tyrannosaurus rex skeleton named "Sue" sold for nearly US$1,000,000 (approximately US$1,000,000), equivalent to about US$1,000,000 (approximately US$1,000,000) today. Before Sue's sale, most fossils cost around US$1,000,000 (approximately US$1,000,000). Fast forward to 2020, when another T. rex, named "Stan," sold for US$1,000,000 (approximately US$1,000,000), more than double the 1997 price, even adjusted for inflation. But is the fossilized bone craze sustainable? Or are we facing a potential extinction-level event?
So unleash the beasts! The park is open. Sit back, relax, and try not to move (they can't see you unless you do) as we delve into the fascinating world of the fossil fuel economy.
Rush for fossil gold
This isn't the first time in history that fossils have become a hot commodity. The word "dinosaur" wasn't coined until 1842, and a few decades later, the thirst for paleontological knowledge became so intense that it became the subject of period dramas.
In the late 1800s, a rivalry between two American paleontologists, Othniel Charles Marsh and Edward Drinker Cope (extraordinary names, we know), was so bitter it became known as "The Bone Wars." The two men raced across the American West trying to unearth more dinosaur bones than the other; the competition became so fierce that they resorted to underhanded methods, including bribing each other's workers, stealing, and even destroying fossil sites.
Marsh and Cope's feud ruined both men financially, but it was undeniably valuable to paleontology as they unearthed thousands of specimens. These days, the fossil market is more likely to make a fossil hunter rich than bankrupt, but with far fewer benefits to science.
No expense spared…
The fossil supply comes from a mix of professional paleontologists, amateur scientists, and commercial fossil hunters, who sometimes clash with the scientific community. Paleontologist Riley Black told The Daily Upside that part of this hostility stems from the way U.S. law treats fossils.
"One of the central issues here is that fossils have historically been treated similarly to minerals or oil, especially in the United States," he said. "We have a patchwork of laws designed to protect fossils on federal lands—like National Park and Bureau of Land Management lands—but we do nothing to dissuade someone who finds a dinosaur on private property from selling it, destroying it, or whatever they wish."
“It’s no wonder some people look at a dinosaur skeleton on their property and see a huge payout potential,” Black added.
A popular market for fossils is auction houses such as Sotheby's and Christie's, and some species can fetch eye-watering prices, particularly the Tyrant King.
"Tyrannosaurs are the dinosaurs everyone wants," Black said. "They're symbols of power and ferocity. Any carnivorous dinosaur will attract more attention, as we've seen with some Allosaurus fossils, but people lose their minds when a T. rex is for sale." He pointed to a 2007 bidding war for a T. rex skull between Leonardo DiCaprio and Nicolas Cage. Cage came out on top, shelling out $ 270,000 for the skull, but later had to return it to the Mongolian government because the fossil had been illegally exported.
(Photo credit: Stephen Rahn/Flickr) While the T. rex is the most expensive item, smaller dinosaurs can still fetch a high price:
- In May 2022, a Deinonychus skeleton sold for $1,400,000 at Christie's. Deinonychus has a bit of Hollywood cachet, as it's sometimes seen as the real dinosaur behind the misnamed velociraptors in Jurassic Park. The real velociraptor was only about two feet tall, so it could barely reach a doorknob, let alone turn it menacingly.
- Some auction houses actively market fossils to private buyers. In September 2022, a 3-meter-tall Iguanodon skeleton sold at the Parisian auction house Giquello for $ 660,738 after being advertised as "a dinosaur for a living room." It's not often you see a prehistoric creature described as an Eames chair.
(Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons/AStrangerintheAlps) Traditional auction houses aren't the only market for fossils. A small T. rex fossil was listed on eBay for $1,400,000 in 2019 by commercial fossil hunter Alan Detrich, who told the WSJ "made millions of dollars in the dinosaur business."
National Geographic… uh… find a way: Privately purchased specimens often disappear from their owners' homes (and presumably living rooms), but occasionally they resurface. In 2022, two years after Stan the T. rex was sold, National Geographic ingeniously tracked down the skeleton using U.S. trade records and discovered it had been shipped to Abu Dhabi. The city's Department of Culture and Tourism confirmed that Stan was scheduled to make his debut at the local Natural History Museum, which is scheduled to open in 2025. It's still unclear who exactly owns Stan, but if he's in the UAE, there's a bitter irony given that the nation grew rich from fossil fuels.
The Rise and Fall of Dinosaur Prices
As the dinosaurs themselves would say, what goes up must come down. The current macroeconomic climate is certainly less dire than an asteroid, but it's still not exceptional.
Some disappointing sell-offs in late 2022 may indicate the fossil market is coming down from its Gulf State-induced high:
- In November, Christie's withdrew a T. rex skeleton named "Shen," estimated at between $15 million and $25 million, from auction after a paleontologist suggested that some of Shen's bones bore a questionable resemblance to Stan's. Christie's said Shen's consignor decided to loan the skeleton to a museum.
- Sotheby's also suffered a T-Rex-sized disappointment just a month later, when a T-Rex skull, which the auction house estimated at around $1,400,000,000, sold for a paltry $6,100,000. Cassandra Hatton, Sotheby's global head of science and popular culture, told The New York Times that the auction "was always designed to gauge the market."
Black told The Daily Upside that the fossil market has long been volatile. In 2013, there was speculation that prices would fall after an auction for a specimen called "The Dueling Dinosaurs" failed to meet the minimum bid, and awareness of illegally exported fossils (like Nic Cage's skull) has increased, but Stan's sale demonstrated just how volatile the market is.
This belongs in a museum! (Yes, we changed Spielberg's movies): The fossil market's bottom would be music to the ears of researchers who are increasingly excluded from the market. Private fossil auctions have decimated the supply of some species for scientific research. According to paleontologist Thomas Carr, about 50% of all T. rex specimens belong to private collectors, many of whom keep them out of sight.
Nero said that even when academic institutions can purchase a fossil, "those purchases reinforce the market value." He pointed to Sue the T. rex, which was purchased by the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago.
While Black is pessimistic about the price drop, he thinks some stricter regulations requiring scientifically important fossils to be documented and stored properly would be a good start.
"We're no longer in the 19th century. The idea of the enterprising fossil hunter collecting specimens to sell to museums no longer fits the bill. Paleontology is slowly and painfully understanding that fossils are part of history. We cannot and should not own them as if tyrannosaurs were luxury cars," he added.
Or, to paraphrase Ian Malcolm, the mathematician from Jurassic Park played by Jeff Goldblum: investors were so worried about whether or not they would do it that they didn't stop to think about whether they should.
