A 100-carat diamond has been sold for $22.1m at an auction in the US.
The eye popping diamond was sold at Sotheby’s auction house in New York.
The diamond originally mined in South Africa,was bought by an anonymous buyer after only three minutes’ of bidding.
The diamond had taken more than a year to cut, polish and perfect.
The $22.1 million price, which includes the buyer’s premium, fell short of the $30.6 million world record price paid for a 118.28 carat white diamond in Hong Kong in 2013.
Sotheby’s said only six perfect diamonds weighing more than 100 carats have been sold at auction in the last 25 years.
The head of Sotheby’s jewellery department in New York, Gary Schuler, described the diamond as “the definition of perfection”.
“The colour is whiter than white, it is free of any internal imperfections and so transparent that I can only compare it to a pool of icy water,” he said before the sale.
The gem was the highlight of a sale of more than 350 jewels expected to sell for a total of more than $50m.
Two years ago, a flawless pink diamond known as the Pink Star set a world record price for a gemstone at auction when it sold for $83m in Geneva.
