Businessman Geoffrey Edelsten and fiancee Gabi Grecko have ended their engagement just two months after the 71-year-old proposed at the Melbourne Cup.

Grecko, a 25-year-old New Yorker, shared a photo of her hand without her $45,000 engagement ring on Instagram on Sunday with a cryptic caption.

• Geoffrey Edelsten proposes to Gabi Grecko at Cup
• Edelsten’s model girlfriend rushed to hospital

“Sometimes you have to do sad things in order to smile again,” the aspiring fashion designer wrote.

Grecko told Fairfax the pair were trying to work things out.

“I was in this for keeps but there has been so much weight on my shoulders that I don’t think he or anyone else understands that the difficulties he’s facing right now, I’m facing them with him,” she said.