New £5 note sells for a whopping £4,150 at Bank of England auction
A NEW plastic £5 note featuring Winston Churchill sold for £4,150 at a Bank of England charity auction today.
The note has the serial number AA01000017 - the lowest available to the public according to auctioneer Spink.
The special lot - the first to be auctioned at the event - reached £2,590 more than the auctioneer's estimate of £1,200.
New £5 notes were released in mid-September.
Those with serial numbers starting AA01 immediately become collectors' items selling for hundreds of pounds on online marketplace eBay.
There are 999,999 new fivers with the AA01 prefix.
The first note, AA01 000001, was donated to the Queen.
The Churchill War Rooms was donated the note bearing serial number AA01 001945 - the year the Second World War officially ended.
Note AA01000017 was one of 232 lots up for grabs at today's charity auction - held in aid of The Myotubular Trust, The Lily Foundation and Bliss.
The second lot had serial number AA01 000018 and sold for £2,400, £1,700 above the estimate.
Lot three, a £5 note with serial number AA01 000019, sold for £2,000.
The charities to benefit from the auction were selected by Bank of England staff.
The new plastic £5 notes are expected to last more than twice as long as their paper predecessors.
We pay for your stories! Do you have a story for The Sun Online news team? Email us at tips@the-sun.co.uk or call 0207 782 4368