Apple’s founding contract sells for $1.6 million at Sotheby’s auction

On April Foolsday in 1976 Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak, and Ron Wayne signed the founding contract for Apple Computer.  Eleven days later, Ron Wayne  decided to sell his 10% of the company for $800, which is now worth $3.9 billion.  The founding contract that made history was originally expected to sell for $150,000, but today sold for a cool $1.6 million to Eduardo Cisneros, chief executive officer of Cisneros Corp, at a Sotheby’s auction in New York, reports Bloomberg. The Cisneros family is the second wealthiest in South America according to a 2006 Forbes listing.

The story goes that apparently the consigner bought the legal papers back in the mid-1990s “from a manuscript dealer” who is thought to had acquired them from Wayne. We’ve posted the bidding after the break.

Update: we’ve confirmed the documents have sold for $1,594,500, but the $1.3 million that Fortune reported doesn’t include the buyers tax the auction house tags on. Thanks Dewitt!

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• Apple Computer Co. founding contract auctioned at Sotheby’s, reveals how much Wayne received for relinquishing his stake (9to5mac.com)