A $1.3 million diamond-encrusted cellphone, a $500,000 racehorse and a $70,000 mini airplane are among the items on display at the Millionaire Fair held in Moscow this week — a screaming showcase of the country’s oil-driven wealth and the free-spending ways of its nouveau riche, The Associated Press reports.

In some ways, the event, which ended Wednesday, was testimony to how far Russia has come since the communist era 15 years ago. Russia now has an estimated 33 billionaires and up to 90,000 millionaires, and Moscow is home to more rich people than New York.

Yet the fair, held in a gleaming shopping mall on the capital’s northern outskirts, also served as a reminder of the tremendous gap between the small group of the extraordinarily wealthy and the nearly one-fifth of Russians who live below the poverty line of $410 per month.

The second annual exhibit in Moscow featured 200 firms offering luxury goods and services such as yachts, sports cars and entire islands to 40,000 visitors. Sales were estimated at $635 million, organizers said.

It was a vanity fair of thin, beautiful women sporting mink fur coats and low necklines decorated with glittering jewelry, and dark-suited, elegant men shadowed by beefy bodyguards.

One of the booths featured Russian-Dutch-made yachts selling for $3.8 million to $20 million, depending on the size. Despite the jaw-dropping prices, the yachts were all sold out until 2009, and the firm, Timmerman Yachts, was taking orders for after that, salesman Dmitry Osankin said. “These are very famous and well-to-do people,” Osankin said of the companies’ clients. “You wouldn’t buy a yacht on your last money, would you?”

For car lovers, there was the $1.7 million Bugatti, which was reportedly snapped up even before the fair kicked off, a 1960 Mercedes Cabriolet for $300,000, and $86,000 Jaguars for more modest consumers. Also on sale was the world’s most expensive cellphone — a $1.27 million model encrusted with gold and diamonds. The Swiss Goldvish company has produced only three such phones.

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