2019 claret and broader market push fine wine in July

The Liv-ex Fine Wine 100 jumped 1.5% in July, boosted by strong secondary market trade for Bordeaux 2019 and wider activity which pushed the number of distinct wines traded to new heights.

Having generally performed fairly poorly for most of this year, the benchmark index has shown some increased signs of life since the recent en primeur campaign, closing above 300 for the first time in five months.

With good wines released at what were generally perceived as good prices, secondary market activity for 2019 claret has been fairly brisk – to the extent that trade in the vintage is up 400% on trade for the 2018s at this time last year.

That said, Bordeaux’s overall share of trade on the platform has continued to decline. Having started the year with 55.3% share of trade it is now down to 40.7%.

This is due to the ever on-going expansion of the secondary market. Liv-ex said on its blog that the number of distinct wines with an LWIN7 traded in July broke through the 1,000 mark for the first time while the number of wines listed with LWIN11 (estate and vintage coded) also rose to new record levels.

Italy continues to be a big beneficiary of this expansion, its share of trade this year rising from 8.8% in 2019 to 14.7% today.

Liv-ex noted that demand from the US and Asia was initially strong but is softening again with another US tariff decision on the mid-August horizon and tensions mounting once again over China and Hong Kong.