Bordeaux 2014: VCC wine of the vintage?

The Liv-ex merchants’ survey crowned Vieux Château Certan as the wine of the 2014 vintage with two thirds expecting increased interest from buyers.

Gathering responses from its 440 members from around the world, Liv-ex’s Bordeaux 2014 Survey showed that the Pomerol-based VCC was “unquestionably” the wine of the vintage appearing in half of all respondents’ top five lists.

Despite this, as Liv-ex explained, overall it was a “northern Médoc vintage”, less consistent on the Right Bank although “as one merchant noted it did produce some ‘belters’,” particularly those with high Cabernet Franc levels.

The top 10 was a 40:60 split in favour of the Left Bank – answering the question the drinks business posed yesterday – with Cheval Blanc, Le Pin and Ausone squaring up with VCC on the Right with all of the first growths and Montrose appearing for the Left Bank. Latour was judged to be the best first growth.

Overall the first growths were ranked as being the equal of the 2006s and joint second with that vintage after 2010 and better than 2008 and 2012.

This is a step up from last year when the wines from the firsts were considered some of the worst since 2007.

For the fifth year in a row Grand Puy Lacoste was picked as the best for potential value along with Calon Ségur, Clerc Milon, Talbot and Figeac among others.

For the first time in 12 years there was no clear consensus on the worst wines of the vintage and with 122 different wines listed with only a few appearing “more than once or twice”.

The vintage was given a 92-point average – better than the 2007, 2008, 2011, 2012 and 2013 vintages – and was compared to the 2008, 2006 and 2001 in style.

There was a generally positive vibe about the level of demand by volume the respondents were expecting for the campaign, with 68.8% expected it to be more than last year and 20.8% saying it would at least be the same as last year although 6.5% thought levels of interest would be 20% less than last year.

Every year Liv-ex presents a “picked basket” of the same wines and asks the merchants what price they expect (not want) those wines to release at.

Including Cos d’Estournel, Ponet Canet, Talbot, Cheval Blanc and Pavie, average prices were pinned at going up 9% versus the 2013s though remaining (just) below 2012 prices by a thin 0.3% margin.

Mouton Rothschild, Cheval Blanc and La Mission Haut-Brion were expected to rise the furthest versus last year with predicted price hikes of 12.8%, 11.4% and 18.8%.