Record-breaker: Sushi chain buys single bluefin tuna for $3.2M

A massive fish weighing hundreds of pounds just broke a record not for its size but for how much someone paid for it.

The owners of a Japanese sushi restaurant bid 510 million yen, or about $3.24 million, for a bluefin tuna during the New Year’s auction at Tokyo’s Yoyosu fish market, Reuters reported.

It wasn’t for a case of fish; it was a single tuna that weighed 536 pounds.

The lucky winner of the auction was Kiyomura Corp, owner of Sushi Zanmai.

The previous record was set by the same company in 2019 when it paid 333.6 million yen, or $2.1 million, Fox Business reported.

It also broke tuna bid records in 2012 for 56.5 million yen and in 2013 for 155 million yen, the BBC reported.

Kiyomura owner Kiyoshi Kimura had hoped to pay “only” 300 or 400 million this year, but the “Tuna King,” as he is known, said “the price shot up before you knew it” and paid much more.

The record-breaking bluefin was cut into sections and sent to the company’s restaurants. It will be sold at the normal price to customers, Reuters reported.

One customer who was able to take a bite out of history told AFP, “I feel like I’ve begun the year in a good way after eating something so auspicious as the year starts,” the BBC reported.