The Whiskystats Whisky Index and our Fabulous Fifty collection drift apart. All our scotch region indices are in the red, while Japan staunchly resists this downward momentum. Here is the Whiskystats Price Update for June 2022.
The June round of auctions brought new price observations for over eight thousand whiskies in our database. Macallan, Springbank and Ardbeg were by far the most traded distilleries. Combined, they accounted for almost five thousand of the total eighteen thousand bottles sold.
Our primary market index, the Whiskystats Whisky Index (WWI), was in the red again as the 500 included whiskies lost 4% in value. At the same time, our Fabulous Fifty collection (Fab50) won 1,9%. That is the second consecutive month these two indices moved in different directions. Usually, we see the WWI and the Fab50 change relatively synchronously, as shown in the below visualization of the monthly index movements since January 2021.
The Fab50 collection consists of 50 handpicked whiskies that are considered highly collectable. However, it is the 500 historically most traded whiskies that account for the changes of the WWI each month. Therefore, the WWI represents a much wider variety of whisky releases, not only collector’s items. Considering this, the above-displayed divergence between the WWI and the Fab50 index becomes more substantial. It looks like the broader market gave way over the past two months while selected rare and collectable whiskies continued to gain value.
Scotch Nosedive
We now look at our scotch region indices to confirm that the downward movement affected the broader market. The below-displayed indices cover the respective region’s 100 historically most traded whiskies each month. All these indices lost ground in the previous round of auctions. Some have been heading south for a couple of months already. But these setbacks come after substantial value gains in the recent past. Campbeltown stands out as the Springbank Price Explosion saw this region’s index gain 60% from November 2021 to March 2022. It is worth noting that compared to January 2021, all these region indices are still positive, some quite significantly.
We observed the most significant setback for the Highlands. These 100 whiskies lost more than 8%. A prime example of a particular release responsible for this drop is the below displayed Glenury Royal 29yo (1970) Rare Malts release. Like the region indices above, this Highland single malt experienced substantial value gains in late 2021. This price rally peaked in December 2021, when the buyer price reached 1.800 Euros. In March 2022, the average buyer price dropped to 1.270 Euros before it jumped back to 1.600 Euros in May. In this latest round of auctions, the price tag fell to 970 Euros dragging our Highland index along.
There are many more examples of the above price pattern. The Brora 21yo (1977) Rare Malts reached 2.850 Euros in May 2022 and now dropped to 2.000 Euros on average, with some lots going as low as 1.400 Euros. With 1.090 Euros, the Oban 16yo Manager’s Dram experienced a setback to the price level it had back in 2018 after briefly trading for as much as 1.700 Euros. Another Brora, the Brora 25yo 2008 Release, fell from 2.300 Euros in February to 1.300 Euros.
Remarkable Trades
Finally, we would like to highlight some notable exceptions to all those value losses. A look at our region indices reveals that Japan is not following the general market trend. Our Japan index gained 1,4% and now stands at 1.150 index points, just below its peak in April. Back to Scotland, we see that although our Rosebank index lost 2,6%, the Rosebank 16yo (1981) Flora & Fauna release reached a new all-time high. This Lowland expression is now trading for more than 1.600 Euros.
Last but certainly not least, we would like to highlight two whiskies that haven’t been seen on auctions for quite some time. It was back in November 2015 when the Hakushu 120.6 from the Scotch Malt Whisky Society sold for 255 Euros. It now reappeared on the auction market and achieved over 3.000 Euros. But the auction comeback of the month goes to the Springbank 36yo (1965) Local Barley. This ultra-rare Local Barley expression had only one price point dating back to October 2012 when it fetched 722 Euros. Needless to say that that price is not relevant anymore. Bottle No.4 just sold for 8.750 Euros.
Disclaimer: the whisky market insights presented in this article are based on the Whiskystats database at the time of publication. Whiskystats is constantly adding new data, and therefore some charts and figures may not match after initial publication.