Hailing a cab for seven figures

last updated 8 January 2015

A pair of aluminum plates just became worth far more than their weight in gold, said Michael M. Grynbaum in The New York Times. Two New York City taxi medallions sold last week for a record-breaking $1 million each. It’s “astonishing growth for the humble medallion,” a transferable disk that every legal yellow cab must have attached to its hood. The first batch sold for $10 each in 1937 ($157.50 in 2011 dollars). The value of a medallion has surged 1,900 percent over the past 30 years, beating the Dow Jones Industrial Average, “gold, oil, and the American house” for healthy returns. The city rarely increases the pool of 13,237 medallions, creating a “scarcity that helps keep values high.” A medallion “will always make good money and pay for itself,” says taxi historian Graham Hodges. Certain things “are just gilt-edged assets.”