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ODDS are 3-to-1 that when Edvard Munch's ''Scream'' comes up for sale at Sotheby's on Wednesday night, it will fetch $150 million to $200 million. And there's a 3-to-2 chance that pastel will become the most expensive artwork ever sold at auction, breaking the current record of $106.5 million set two years ago at Christie's for Picasso's ''Nude, Green Leaves and Bust.'' As for who will buy ''The Scream,'' bets are 5-to-2 that it will be a Russian, 3-to-1 an Asian or European and 4-to-1 an American. That's the thinking, anyway, from Ladbrokes, the British bookmaking chain, which has been analyzing the fate of what Sotheby's is billing as the most recognizable image in art history after the ''Mona Lisa.'' Art isn't generally Ladbrokes's metier, but laying odds on just how much this work will get has even captured the attention of gamblers used to putting their money on horse races or boxing. Jessica Bridge, a spokeswoman for the company, said that the bookmakers ''apply the same math and algorithms we do for football or hockey.'' [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Given the vast amounts of new money flooding the art market these days, it might be a surprise that only three artworks have ever broken the $100 million barrier at auction: Picasso's ''Boy With a Pipe (The Young Apprentice),'' which sold for $104.1 million in 2004; Alberto Giacometti's sculpture ''Walking Man I,'' at $104.3 million in 2010; and Picasso's ''Nude, Green Leaves and Bust,'' the record setter at $106.5 million in 2010. With Edvard Munch's ''Scream'' on sale at Sotheby's on Wednesday, could a fourth work join that elite club? (See related story, Page 1.) [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]