EL0NMUSK, BAD G1RL: In Hong Kong, personalized license car plates are a coveted luxury

Kristie Lu Stout and Jadyn Sham, CNN

At a government auction in Hong Kong, “EL0NMUSK” sold for the equivalent of $1,405.

The namesake of the headline-grabbing tech titan is one of a number of selected vehicle license plates — including “BAD G1RL,” “LATTE” and “SHADYB1Z” — that went under the hammer at the end of January. The auction’s highest bid went to “1 HH” for 115,000 Hong Kong dollars ($14,684).

It’s a hot market. Hong Kong residents have been known to pay millions of dollars for a coveted plate. In 2008, “18” — considered a lucky number in Cantonese — went for 16.5 million Hong Kong dollars ($2.1 million). Eight years later, “28” went for 18.1 million Hong Kong dollars ($2.3 million).

At the latest Lunar New Year auction, “R” sold for 25.5 million Hong Kong dollars ($3.2 million). But the record was set in March 2021, when one bidder spent 26 million Hong Kong dollars ($3.3 million) for a plate with a single letter: “W.”

A Transportation Department spokesperson told CNN that all revenue from the auctions of personalized vehicle plates, which occur regularly, go straight to the Hong Kong government’s Treasury.

For car owners, the vanity plates can carry personal meaning. Real estate tycoon Cecil Chao purchased his, “CEC1L,” at a relative steal for just over $20,000 Hong Kong dollars ($2,550 in 2007). It now graces his silver and burgundy Rolls Royce.

He also has a Bentley bearing his surname “CHAO” and a convertible Rolls Royce with “4” — an unlucky number in Cantonese and Mandarin, as it sounds like “death,” but not for the Shanghai-born property developer.

“I was born in China, in Shanghai,” says Chao. “In Shanghainese, number four (sounds like) ‘happiness’ — this is my philosophy of life.”

Since 2006, over 40,000 “personalized vehicle registration marks” have been sold at auction by the Hong Kong Transport Department, with prices starting at around 5,000 Hong Kong dollars ($640).

Interested parties must first inquire whether their proposed mark meets the Transport Department’s requirements. Car owners can create plates of up to eight characters (including spaces) but cannot include the letters “I,” “O” and “Q.” Once the mark is cleared, it has to be bought via auction.

The city’s vanity plate phenomenon has sparked social media fan accounts like @HKnumberplates on Twitter, where hunters share their favorite finds online using the hashtag #HKnumberplates.

CNN recently spotted several plates on the streets, including a yellow Lamborghini with “SIN,” a black BMW with “DARKSIDE” and a white Porsche SUV with “CNN.”

Hong Kong-based creative director Michele Salati, who launched the HKVANIT1ES project three years ago, considers “0K LA” as his personal favorite. Widely seen around town on an iconic red taxi, it was also the first license plate he noticed when he moved to the city seven years ago.

“These vanity plates are used by their owners to highlight their status, wealth, humor, desires, superstitions or even their favorite food,” Salati says.

“To me, each plate is like a line of poetry, racing through the streets of the city. I could see that it’s a kind of poetry in motion.”

Salati’s online platform collects photos of personalized plates and invites users to string them together into poetry.

He says he’s gathered about 2,500 images and 300 poems for his platform, including a rap by local artist Dough Boy (that later became a music video) and a short ode titled “TGIF” by a user named Tony:

TGIF
TIME OUT
LIV2LUV
CITYLIFE

A number of eyebrow-raising personalized plates have also been spotted on Teslas racing around the city including “BEAVER,” “MR XXL” and the rather cheeky “PASS GAS.”

The new owner of the “EL0NMUSK” registration mark, and the make of their car, is currently unknown.

Top image caption: A yellow Lamborghini in Hong Kong sporting the license plate “SIN.” Illustration by Ian Berry, photos by CNN/Adobe Stock.

This article was updated to include results from the latest license plate auction on Feb. 12.

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Kevin Broad and Alex Dicker contributed to this report.