Decanter World Wine AwardsAsian buyers snap up blue-chip Bordeaux in New York
- Tuesday 16 November 2010
Petrus: the 2000 snapped up for $72,600
Sotheby’s US$5,403,527 sale opened with 128 cases from vintage 2000 consigned by Bordeaux Winebank.
The Winebank is a subsidiary of Norwegian businessman Henning Thoresen’s BWB Group, which specializes in trading wines certifiably originating in chateaus’ cellars.
Each of three 2000 Pétrus case lots (high-estimated at US$50,000) realized US$72,600.
Asians’ passion for Lafite Rothschild was demonstrated in the US$57,475 and US$54,450 paid for separate lots of 1982 Lafite (US$40,000 estimates) from two non-Winebank consigners.
One Winebank 2000 Lafite lot fetched US$36,300, and three more each fetched US$33,275 (US$25,000 estimates).
By comparison, at Sotheby’s record-smashing 29 October Hong Kong auction of holdings from Lafite cellars, one 2000 lot fetched US$71,806; two more brought $62,440 each; and another two $59,318 each.
In Manhattan on 12 November, each of Winebank’s 10 vintage 2000 Mouton Rothschild lots (US$15,000 estimates) brought US$22,990.
Jamie Ritchie, Sotheby’s New York wine department president, said ‘strong global demand saw 94% of the sold lots from the Bordeaux Winebank realize prices in excess of their high estimates.’
Winebank will offer vintage 2000 bottles at Sotheby’s 23 January auction in Hong Kong.
At NYWines/Christies’ sale on 12-13 November, an Asian private bidder paid US$120,000 for an Lafite superlot of 1996-2003 cases. The high estimate was US$70,000.
Have your say!
ryan davies
November 29 17:07
Jay, couldn't agree with you more.
Wine is worth a baseball cards comparison. Nobody thought of wine as investments just a few years ago, now everybody does. This is very similar to baseball cards decades ago. Once people began to realize that baseball cards would increase in value, they were held onto and thus there was a decrease in scarcity. Kids had started putting their collections in plastic sheets and hard cases rather than bicycle spokes and shoe boxes, and investors would cross-check every card picked from a pack against the latest issue of Beckett's price guide. Just as with baseball cards, scarcity wont be as much of an issue in the future with current vintages as people are holding on to them moreso than in years past. By the mid to late 90’s, all modern day baseball card prices plummeted and are still today much below the value they saw in the early 90’s. The only cards that held their value, and have in fact appreciated, are the truly rare cards.
normanten
November 25 03:12
This is just ridiculous...
Richard
November 24 06:14
Remarkable isn't it? How a bottle of wine costs so much and people are willing to buy them..so far I think prices are still gonna go up..I heard about the 2009 vintage is really gonna be something to look at for wine lovers,maybe in a few years time this vintage may be a contestant to break the reigning record. Here's what these guys have to say
http://www.wineinvestmentadvice.com/premium_liquid_assets/
Jay
November 18 15:26
Nice, communist profits flowing back to the West for luxury goods - there is a lesson here: we need to focus on making things that we westerners make best while testing the low-grade goods entering our countries from nations with no toxicity standards to make sure they don't poison us.