The 25-year-old (yes, 25) bought the most expensive license plate in the world, "Abu Dhabi 1", at an auction in the Emirate earlier this year.
Khouri snatched the Guinness Record from his brother Talal, 35, who has spent close to $10 million on Abu Dhabi plates "5" and "7". As a bonus, the older Khouri has also purchased "430" to match his 430 model Ferrari, at the relative bargain price of $120,000.
But the Khouri family, who reportedly earned their wealth in land development and the stock market, are far from being alone in their unabashed quest for vanity plates, which has become a growing obsession worldwide.
In the last year, Abu Dhabi auctions have netted over $100 million in sales of over 700 plates. The tradition dates back even further in Hong Kong where plate "9" was sold to tycoon Albert Yeung for over $1.5 million in 1994. Plate worship is also catching on in the West. In England, automotive designer Afzal Kahn paid around $750,000 for the "F1" plate in January, while in the U.S. state of Delaware, property magnate Anthony Fusco laid down $675,000 for "6" last February.
The Abu Dhabi auction, which remains the wealthiest, has followed a model practiced by plate auctioneers in China where proceeds are donated to help accident victims.
The move was adopted by Chinese authorities following allegations of corruption in the plate selling process, with officials reportedly accepting bribes for coveted numbers. Unsurprisingly, it is a charge that also resonates in the Middle East.
In Lebanon, where average plates contain up to seven digits, those possessing four and three digit plates have long been associated with extraordinary wealth or political connections, known locally as "wasta".
According to one Lebanese Member of Parliament, the field is rife with foul play. The MP, who wished to remain anonymous because of the sensitivity of the issue, alleged that low plate numbers had often been awarded by ministers to curry favor either with prominent citizens or other influential civil servants. He said the practice was given an added boost over the last decade when letters were introduced into the license plate numbering system, creating province codes such as "B" for Beirut or "S" for Sidon as prefixes. Naturally, this multiplied the potential number of low digit numbers available, thus adding "tens of millions of dollars" in plate value to the informal reward system, the MP claimed.
The debate in Abu Dhabi, by contrast, is far less focused on transparency than it is on decorum. Videos of the auction proceedings have been posted on youtube.com where intense bidding wars are now available for public consumption.
In an interview with Globe and Mail newspaper, Emirates Auctions manager Abdullah Al Mannaei said some participants had complained because bidding paddles were made of flimsy cardboard. "I was worried that if we used plastic, people would hurt themselves, or each other," he said.
