Fine Wine Valuations: Is the Top End Moving First?

August is traditionally quieter in the wine trade. With much of Europe on holiday, it is also when some of our usually very busy clients finally get around to asking:

“What’s my wine worth? Can I have an updated valuation?”

For seasoned collectors, valuations over the last three years have brought little joy. But several portfolio reviews over the past fortnight have reinforced something we have been discussing for some time:

The first meaningful price movements are appearing at the top end of the market.

The Market Has Changed Direction

The context matters.

From May 2020 to October 2022, the Liv-ex Fine Wine 1000 rose 43.7%, before correcting approximately 28.7% between October 2022 and August 2025. Past performance is not a guide to future performance.

Almost three years of falling prices followed.

Today, the picture looks different:

• Liv-ex Fine Wine 1000: +1.2% over 12 months
• Champagne 50: +2.6%. Past performance is not a guide to future performance.
• Burgundy 150: +1.9%
• Liv-ex Fine Wine 100: +3.3%. Past performance is not a guide to future performance.

The broader market is stabilising.

What interests us more, however, is what is happening beneath the indices.

What We're Seeing in Client Portfolios

These are five examples from valuations completed over the last fortnight:

• Rousseau Chambertin 2004
  Purchased March 2026
• DRC Romanée-Saint-Vivant 2005
  Purchased July 2025
• DRC Échezeaux 2005
  Purchased February 2026
• Leroy Richebourg 2012
  Purchased December 2025
• Lafleur 2016
  Purchased October 2025

These are individual valuations, not realised returns.

More importantly, over a matter of months, the valuations of several of these positions have moved differently from their respective regional indices.

That divergence tells us something.

The market isn't recovering evenly.

Why the Top End?

Look at the names above: DRC, Leroy, Rousseau and Lafleur.

These are wines where demand can return much faster than supply.

This is particularly pronounced in back-vintage Burgundy. There may be only a handful of comparable cases available globally at any one time. Once the lowest-priced stock is absorbed, the next available case can sit materially higher.

Following a correction of approximately 34% in the Burgundy 150, that supply dynamic becomes particularly interesting. Past performance is not a guide to future performance.

Prices have reset substantially.

Production hasn't increased. The producers haven't become less important. And for mature vintages, available supply has continued to decline as bottles are consumed.

That is why a change in demand can move prices sharply at this end of the market, in either direction.

The Burgundy 150 is up around 1.9% over 12 months. Past performance is not a guide to future performance.

Individual wines, such as the four Burgundy examples above, can move quite differently from the index.

That is the part of the market we are watching.

Purchase Price Matters

A recovering market doesn't make every wine a good investment.

Producer, vintage quality, critic scores, production levels, vintage yields and relative value against comparable vintages remain fundamental to our buying decisions.

But following a correction of this magnitude, we are putting increasing emphasis on another measure:

How far has the wine corrected from levels it has previously traded at?

A wine sitting 30–40% below its previous high deserves closer examination.

Not because we assume it will return to that high, but because it gives us evidence of the level the market has previously been prepared to support.

The next question is simple:

What has actually changed?

If production remains tiny, critical quality is unchanged, the producer's standing remains intact and available supply has continued to diminish, but the price is 30–40% lower, we potentially have a valuation dislocation.

There is no guarantee of any recovery towards the previous peak.

A wine purchased 35% below peak can still fall further.

We aren't buying because something used to be more expensive. We're buying where price has corrected significantly further than the fundamentals.

Valuation vs. Realisable Value

There is one important caveat.

A valuation increase is not the same as a realised return.

This is particularly relevant with rare Burgundy, where limited market depth can accelerate prices upwards but can also make price discovery more difficult.

We therefore don't value portfolios from a single advertised merchant price.

We look at live bids, recent trades, current listings, bid-offer spreads, provenance and the amount of stock available around a particular price.

The important question isn't:

“What is somebody asking?”

It's:

“Where can this wine realistically trade?”

Where Are We Now?

It is still too early to declare a broad fine wine market recovery.

But after almost three years of falling prices, the direction of travel has changed.

The major indices are positive over 12 months. Liquidity is improving. And within client portfolios, the clearest valuation movements are at the top end of the market.

The five wines above are simply recent examples from the last fortnight.

The top end is moving differently from the wider market.

For investors, the task now is not simply to buy fine wine because prices have fallen.

It is to identify the wines where quality, scarcity, relative value and the scale of the correction align.

That is where we are currently focusing.

Written by Olivia Souto - Senior Advisor at Cellar Advisor .