A bracelet owned by Wallis Simpson, whose affair with Edward VIII led to his abdication, has sold for a world record-breaking £4.5m ($7m) at auction.

The diamond panther bracelet, was sold by Sotheby’s. It was the most expensive bracelet and most expensive Cartier item to be sold at any auction.

It was one of 20 pieces owned by the Duke and Duchess of Windsor to go under the hammer in the sale, which raised a total of £7,975,550 ($12,417,369m).

A rare pink diamond that is regarded as one of the most desirable and beautiful in the world was sold for a record 46.16 million dollars on Tuesday.

Sotheby’s had valued the 24.78 carat Fancy Intense Pink diamond mounted on a ring at 27 million to 38 million dollars ahead of the sale in a luxury lakeside hotel.

But intense bidding wiped out the record of over 24 million dollars set during an auction in December 2008 in the sale of a grey-blue diamond Wittelsbach.

An Andy Warhol canvas of a black-and-white Coke bottle has sold for $35.36m at an auction in New York.

Sotheby’s said Coca-Cola [4] (Large Coca-Cola) “is a landmark in the artist’s creation of his pop art style”.

Organizers reportedly whet the appetite of live bidders by serving small bottles of soda pop as guests mingled ahead of the New York sale.

A painting of a nude by Amedeo Modigliani fetched nearly 69 million dollars at a Sotheby’s auction in New York, setting a new record for the Italian painter.

The circa 1917 canvas, titled “Nu assis sur un divan (La Belle Romaine),” had been estimated before the auction to go for more than 40 million dollars.

Five bidders on Tuesday competed over what Sotheby’s called the “iconic” and “stunning nude,” driving the final price to 68,962,500 dollars.

The massive sale highlighted the first of the autumn art auctions in New York at Sotheby’s and rival Christie’s, with both houses predicting a surge in demand.

Three bottles of Chateau Lafite’s 1869 vintage each sold for a record price of HK$1.8 million ($230,000) at a sale in Hong Kong last saturday.

All three were bought by the same Asian telephone bidder, said Sotheby’s, which offered almost 2,000 bottles of Lafite shipped directly from the cellars of the chateau in Pauillac, near Bordeaux.

The 1869s – the oldest bottles in a range of vintages that spanned 139 years – were each estimated to sell for between HK$40,000 and HK$60,000.

An exceptinally rare pink stone is set to break the record for being the world’s most expensive diamond ever.

The pink stone is estimated to be worth $27-38 million when it goes under the hammer on November 16 at Sotheby’s in Geneva

It is classified as ‘fancy intense pink’ – the most perfect pink colour – by the Gemological Institute of America, and is set between shield-shaped diamond shoulders on a silver ring.