A sushi entrepreneur has paid a record 510.3m yen (£2.4m) for a giant bluefin tuna at a prestigious auction in Tokyo’s main fish market.

Kiyoshi Kimura, who styles himself the “Tuna King”, paid the top price for the 243kg (536lbs) specimen, which was caught off Japan’s northern coast.

“I’d thought we would be able to buy a little cheaper but the price soared before you knew it,” said Kimura after the pre-dawn auction. “I was surprised at the price. I hope that by eating auspicious tuna, as many people as possible will feel energised.”

The 510.3m yen price at the new year auction was the highest since comparable data started being collected in 1999. The previous record was 333.6m yen for a 278kg bluefin in 2019 after the market moved from its traditional Tsukiji area in central Tokyo to a more modern facility. The top bidder last year paid 207m yen for a 276kg bluefin.

Shortly after this year’s auction, the tuna was butchered and turned into sushi for Kimura’s restaurant chain, selling for about 500 yen (£2.40) a roll.

“I feel like I’ve begun the year in a good way after eating something so auspicious as the year starts,” 19-year-old Minami Sugiyama told Agence France-Presse from a table at a Kimura restaurant in Tsukiji.

Fellow customer Kiyoshi Nishimura agreed. “Even without dipping it in soy sauce, there’s sweetness. And the richness, the texture – it just makes you feel happy,” said the 40-year-old Shinto priest.

New year tunas commanded only a fraction of their usual top prices during the pandemic as restaurants scaled back operations.