Investors still willing to splash out on fine wines

The secondary fine wine market appears “immune” from economic turmoil across the globe, fine wine sales platform Liv-ex has reported. 

A new quarterly report from Liv-ex shows that “2022 has picked up where 2021 left off". 

It follows a very strong performance on the secondary fine wine market last year, which saw an unbroken 18-month run of gains in both the Liv-ex Fine Wine 100 and Fine Wine 1000, Drinks Business reported.

The Liv-ex 100 and the Liv-ex 1000 indices were up by 1.9% and 3.5% respectively in the first three months of 2022. 

There were particularly impressive gains in prices for for Burgundy and Champagne in the Liv-ex 1000 (which is the broadest measure of the secondary market). Those regions prices were up 14.6% and 9.6% respectively.

A star performer among the Liv-ex 1000’s component wines over the last three months was Domaine Leflaive 2012. 

The Puligny-Montrachet-based wine estate (above) has seen prices rise 76% in just three months. 

The report comes as a surprise given economic challenges associated with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, with rising inflation and interest rates, soaring prices in crude oil and other commodities and the rising cost of living.

“As an alternative asset it retains certain advantages over mainstream financials in difficult times, especially as it is both a diminishing asset and one where time invested in holding on to stock is often necessary and generally encouraged," the report said. "Thus, its volatility is extremely low.”