2010 claret dominates wine trading

There was a high level of activity surrounding 2010 Bordeaux on Liv-ex last week, as the vintage accounted for 42.8% of all Bordeaux trade by value.

Château Haut-Brion

Liv-ex reported that for the week of 9-15 October, Bordeaux accounted for 80.9% of all trade by value while over 40% of that trade was centred on the 2010 vintage.

All of the week’s top five wines traded by value were 2010 claret. They were: Haut-Brion with a 6.1% share of total trade, Lafite at 5.3%, Lafleur at 3%, Margaux at 2.6% and Montrose with 2.5%.

Interest in Bordeaux has been rising over the summer and was remarked upon in September as the bid to offer ratio improved in its favour while interest in the 2010 has actually been rising over the past few months as well.

After a flurry of interest in the 2005 vintage after the release of Robert Parker’s retrospective scores, it was the 2010s that seemed to be emerging as the vintage buyers were picking up on.

The reasons are obvious. Prices for the 2010s have been in free fall since their release in 2011. The Haut-Brion for example at £5,295 a case (at its last trade) is down 26% from its release price.

Meanwhile, the gap between the 100 Parker point Montrose and its more expensive but identically scored 2009 has been explored very recently.

In short, this is a great vintage, way off its peak, and there’s a lot of it around in a market that appears to be gaining a bit of forward momentum. As buyers return to Bordeaux (as they were always going to), 2010 claret looks to be a good bet for a lot more activity.

Liv-ex added that Italy had “another strong week” seeing a good share of the volume trade, while Burgundy’s share of trade “continued to wane”.