Small increases for fine wine in February

Liv-ex’s benchmark fine wine indices both saw small gains in February, each setting new records in the process.

The Fine Wine 100 – tracking the 100 most traded wines on the Exchange – rose just 0.4% last month but that was enough to lead it to an “unprecedented” 15 months of consecutive gains.

The broader Fine Wine 1000 meanwhile went up 0.6%, closing the month on 303.15 which is the seventh consecutive highest monthly rise in its history. Its previous peak was 279.69 in July 2011.

Wines from the Right Bank led the way on the Fine Wine 100 last month, Vieux Château Certan’s 2009 and Cheval Blanc’s 2006 rose 10.4% and 7.4% respectively.

Other top risers included the 2012 Châteauneuf du Pape from Beaucastel and Clos des Papes which went up 6.4% and 5.4% respectively and the 2009 Ornellaia (up 6.2%).

Unable to sustain its rise in January, the 2009 vintage from Smith Haut Lafitte led the worst performing labels, down 5.1%.

Also down were Cheval Blanc’s 2009 (-3.9%), Domaine de la Romanée-Conti’s La Romanée-Conti 2012 (-3.8%), La Mission Haut-Brion’s 2009 (-3.2%) and Latour’s 2009 (-3.1%).

On the Fine Wine 1000 meanwhile, the Champagne 50 was the best-performing sub-index, rising 1.8%, although the Italy 100 and Rest of the World 50 saw small declines of 0.3% and 0.1% respectively, although both sub-indices are up over the course of the year-to-date.

The most successful sub-index over the course of a year is the Burgundy 150 which is up 25.9%, out-pacing the Bordeaux Legends 50 which has risen 22.8%.

The other Bordeaux sub-index, the Bordeaux 500, is up nearly 22% – of its constituent parts the Second Wines 50 is the most successful (up 31.3%) while the Sauternes 50 has proved the slowest mover but has still managed to gain 6.9%.