Picasso painting fetches record price: reports

Pablo Picasso's painting, "Le Reve", has fetched a record price, selling for $155 million to SAC Capital hedge fund manager Steven A. Cohen.

Cohen bought the piece, painted in oil in 1932, from casino owner Steve Wynn, reports The New York Post.

A day after originally agreeing to sell "Le Reve" to Cohen in 2006 for $139 million, Wynn accidentally poked his elbow into it, causing a minor tear.

Wynn called it, "the world's clumsiest and goofiest thing to do," and said he was glad he was responsible and not one of his guests.

The casino mogul, who suffers from vision problems, agreed to release Cohen from the sale and restore it. Cohen has now bought it for $16 million more than the pre-damage price.

"The restoration seems to be factored into the price," Beverly Schreiber Jacoby, valuation specialist and president of New York-based BSJ Fine Art, told Bloomberg. "If you didn't know that it has been damaged, you would not see it. It's superbly restored."

It is the highest ever price an American art collector has paid for art, reports Bloomberg.

Cohen, a known art collector, is said to have paid about $120 million in 2012 for four bronze sculptures by Henri Matisse of a woman's back, The New York Times' Deal Book reports.