'It’s really quite good': Chinese crypto entrepreneur eats banana he bought for $6.2m last week

Fri, 29 Nov, 2024 - 12:59

The cryptocurrency entrepreneur Justin Sun has fulfilled a promise he made after spending $6.2m on an artwork featuring a banana duct-taped to a wall — by eating the fruit.

At one of Hong Kong’s priciest hotels, the 34-year-old chomped down on the banana in front of dozens of journalists and influencers after giving a speech hailing the work as “iconic” and drew parallels between conceptual art and cryptocurrency.

“It’s much better than other bananas,” Mr Sun, who was born in China, said after getting his first taste. “It’s really quite good.”

Titled 'Comedian', the conceptual work created by the Italian artist Maurizio Cattelan was sold at a Sotheby’s auction in New York last week, with Mr Sun among seven bidders.

Mr Sun said he felt “disbelief” in the first 10 seconds after he won the bid, before realising “this could become something big”. In the 10 seconds after that, he decided he would eat the banana.

“Eating it at a press conference can also become a part of the artwork’s history,” he said.

The debut of the edible creation at the 2019 Art Basel show in Miami Beach sparked controversy and raised questions about whether it should be considered art — Mr Cattelan’s stated aim.

Mr Sun also this week disclosed a $30m investment in World Liberty Financial, a cryptocurrency project backed by US president-elect Donald Trump.

He was last year charged by the US Securities and Exchange Commission with offering and selling unregistered securities in relation to his crypto project Tron. The case is ongoing.

The banana was reportedly bought for less than a dollar from a fruit stall on Manhattan’s Upper East Side, staffed by Shah Alam, who works for $12 an hour.

Mr Sun later pledged to buy 100,000 bananas from Alam’s stall and said he hoped to visit Alam’s stall one day in person.