Access off-market whisky oportunities.
Want a peek behind closed doors? We have access to a number of unadvertised off-market whisky opportunities.
Like any precious commodity, a distinct off-market whisky sector exists within the whisky industry.
The whisky market concerns itself principally with rare or discontinued brands, rare editions of brands, antique bottles or casks, coveted brands or editions that have ascertained a special value in the market etc: in fact the off-market whisky segment is quite diverse. It can be an incredibly fascinating market segment and furthermore, well chosen, off-market whisky can be an extremely lucrative proposition for the informed investor.
Bear in mind that whisky has a huge global market which is calculated to reach a value of USD 6.7 billion by 2031, according to Allied Market Research. Their survey valued the market at US$4.3bn in 2021.
Whisky production is relatively finite, especially in Scotland.
New distilleries come on to the market only so often and existing distilleries only expand production at a relatively slow rate, so global demand is liable to pressure supply over the coming decade. This augurs well for the collectors’ and investors’ market and, of course, the wider global interest in whisky throughout the world will no doubt place a further premium on the value of off-market product.
Whisky casks and bottles can auction for huge sums of money: In Nov 2019 a 1989 ex-sherry ”hogshead’ ‘Macallan cask sold for HK$ 4.4 million, which worked out at around US$572,000 at the extant exchange rate, at a Fine and Rare Wine and Whisky sale which the Hong Kong branch of Bonham’s’ Auction House. The term ”hogshead”, by the way, refers to a cask which is reconstructed from bourbon cask staves to which new oak ends have been attached. These can have a prior life as sherry casks before being purchased second hand for whisky distillation. Hogsheads have a capacity of roughly 250 liters or 66 gallons.
Stewart and Robertson sells roughly 60% of its whisky directly from the distilleries but 40% of its product is privately held. From this standpoint we are able to supply collectors with a intriguing and profitable array of rare product.
If we move just 3 years onward, to July of 2022, a 1975 Ardbeg Cask No. 3 single malt, which was actually released by the distillery itself, was sold to a private Asian collector for a whapping GBP 16m (so around USD 20m). This was the one and only cask to have survived both the 1981-1987 and 1991-1997 closures at Ardbeg and it sold for the highest price ever paid for a whisky cask.
If that’s out of your ballpark, even a bottle of rare Ardbeg fetched hammer price of GBP 35,000 at Auction in 2022.
One only needs to look at the differential between the 2019 and 2022 sales records and it becomes clear that rare whisky cask and bottle values are rising very strongly indeed, in the particular case of the highest value obtained at auction, by a factor of 400% in 3 years. Now cast your mind back to the Allied Market Research prognosis for the development of the whisky market over the next decade and you can see how this global phenomenon will augur for further increases in the value of a portfolio of rare whisky casks and bottles.
Obviously the more one learns about the history and development of the whisky market, the more opportunities for profit one will find.