When investors value companies they find all kinds of ways to do it and one investor can place a value of £1m whereas another can place a value of £100m.
Why is such a thing as the value of a trading company so subjective?
Well, there are factors such as potential, property, defensibility, uniqueness.
And then you look at the art world. Here, in an artists’ lifetime, dreadful, poster art such as Monet’s water lilies were coveted, whereas van Gough’s sunflowers were derided.
Now they are both worth stupid amounts of money.
But why is this ?
Well, the reason is quite simple, intrinsically they have little worth or value. Paintings of flowers are easy to do and easy to replicate – exactly if you want.
All these paintings do is provide a value for hubris. The only thing a £20m painting represents is the arrogance of the person who paid £20m. It is a bet that their arrogance is worth more than that of the nxt person.
And so what price do you place on a song or a movie ? The most valuable song in history – happy birthday – was recently ruled to be out of copyright and is a dirge anyway. Poems, despite, arguably, being more beautiful and valuable than many paintings, are valueless.
You own a copy of The Wateland ? Try getting £100 let alone £100m for it. Yet it is intellectually more valuable than any painting, in my view. Erase the Mona Lias or erase The Wasteland ? I know which way I would go.
When I studied film there was always an argument about it as craft or art. The reality is there is no difference. Art is something speculators and hedgies make of craft. They have always been with us, fir centuries, which is why Monet died rich and van Gough died as a pauper.