Fine wine prices drop 15% in 2011

Fine wine prices fell 15% in 2011, fine wine index Liv-ex has reported.

The Liv-ex Fine Wine 100, the fine wine industry’s leading benchmark, fell 3.9% in December, its sixth consecutive month of decline. It closed at 286.33 – down 14.85% for the year.

The Liv-ex Fine Wine 50, which tracks the daily price movement of recent vintages of the Bordeaux first growths, fell rapidly between Christmas and New Year. Soft demand saw the benchmark lose 4.96% in December – its fourth-largest monthly fall since January 2000. 

Price drops in the third and fourth quarters saw the index fall to 334.45 at the end of the year – down 16.62%.

And price falls were not confined to first growths. The Liv-ex Fine Wine Investables index, which tracks chateaux commonly found in a wine investment portfolio, fell 9.97% in 2011.