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Wealthy US millennials more than twice as likely to invest in wine than Gen X or Boomers

25 June 2024 By Arabella Mileham

Young, rich Americans are twice as likely to invest in wine than those over the age of 44, a new report has found.

The 2024 Bank of America Private Bank Study of Wealthy Americans looked at attitudes and investment plans among more than 1,000 Americans across different age group, all of whom had a net worth of at least $3 million in investable assets.

It found that interest in collectibles is highest among the younger set (aged 21-43), with around 94% of Gen Z and Millennials interested in collectibles, compared to 80% of Generation X (aged 44-60), and well ahead of Boomer and the Silent Generation on 57% and 55% respectively.

It found that three-quarters of younger people agree that it’s no longer possible to achieve above-average returns with stocks and bonds alone, compared to just one quarter of those Gen X and older – reflecting the turbulence of the market in recent years.

“The past two years have seen more inflation than in decades, sharply rising interest rates, a bear-market year for stocks in 2022, a headline fraud case in the burgeoning crypto industry, two major geopolitical conflicts and the meteoric rise of AI tools in everyday life. These crosswinds are affecting the ways that wealthy people think about financial decisions, as data in this report shows,” the report noted.

As a result, younger people “are even more enthusiastic about collectibles… [while] the interest in collectibles declines with each successive generation.”

Around 36% of the Americans aged 21-43 said they would be interested in collecting wine and spirits, compared to 46% who were interested in watches and 39% in jewellery. This contrasted to only 13% for those aged 44 and over.

Wine and spirits featured second only to watches and jewellery in terms of attractiveness to millennials and gen Z across both age groups.

Reassuringly, wine and spirits are more attractive to younger collectors than rare cars (32%) or sneakers (30%), with only 2% of those aged 44 and over showing interest in collectible footware. However, twice as many Americans aged 44 and over (26%) showed interest in coins compared to wine and spirts.

The new study chimes with the Alternative Wealth Report by Cult Wine Investment, published in 2022, which found that a new breed of younger investors were investing in wine, comic books and trainers with cultural cachet as they wanted to feel engaged by more than financial reward, seeking out items they perceived as “cooler” than the average investment.

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