Which wines have been trending upwards on the Liv-ex Exchange this year?
The fine wine market may be showing signs of stabilisation, but not all wines are moving in the same direction. Read more here
The fine wine market may be showing signs of stabilisation, but not all wines are moving in the same direction. While some continue to drift lower, others are beginning to attract renewed demand and record higher transaction prices.
For merchants looking to deploy capital with greater confidence, identifying these early signs of recovery can be just as important as finding value.
Wines showing sustained upward trading activity can provide useful signals that buyers are returning to the market and that prices are beginning to stabilise.
To identify where this may be happening, Liv-ex analysed transaction data from the past year and highlighted wines that have demonstrated a consistent upward trend in realised trade prices. While past performance is never a guarantee of future returns, these wines offer insight into where confidence appears to be rebuilding and which parts of the market deserve closer attention.
Defining an upward trend
There are many wines that are now trading above their 2025 lows, but a consistent upward trend is harder to find. Even if advertised prices online begin to climb, there is little publicly available sales data to validate this uptick. Therefore, we use only Liv-ex sales data to assess true market trends.
The results reveal an interesting pattern. Many of the wines showing the clearest signs of recovery come from the market’s most actively traded regions. However, pockets of opportunity are also emerging elsewhere, suggesting that demand is returning selectively rather than lifting the entire market at once.
An upward trend was defined as three or four quarter-on-quarter increases in average trade price over the past year.
Bordeaux
Bordeaux comprised more of the top performing wines than any other region, thanks in part to its general liquidity (high volume and Liv-ex’s top-traded region). Mouton dominated, with five vintages on the list: 2015, 2005, 2010, 2018 and 2008. The 2015 had strong performance over the entire period but appears to have come to rest at its 2020 lows, the bulk of its upward movement taking place in late 2025.
Lafite 2015 tells a slightly different story. While, like Mouton 2015, it is currently trading at its 2020 lows, there is less evidence of prices coming to rest. With consistent upward momentum and a tight spread, there is more evidence pointing to continued positive price performance.
Prices of Lafite 2021, 2019 and Lynch-Bages 2018 all fell between Q2 and Q3 2025, but have ticked up each quarter since. Even for Lynch 2018, which just scraped its way onto this list, the newfound upward trend is evident.
For merchants, this is significant because Bordeaux remains the deepest and most liquid segment of the secondary market. Sustained price increases in highly traded wines are often more meaningful than similar movements in less liquid categories, as they reflect repeated buyer conviction rather than isolated transactions.
Champagne
As with Bordeaux, Champagne’s relative liquidity has allowed for more of the region’s wines to be considered in this analysis. Nevertheless, the Champagne 50 does appear to have now found support on its long term upward trendline – as we settle into recovery, it should be a region to watch. Some of the most impressive performances (defined upward trends) of the past year, however, have been for non-vintage Champagnes such as Pol Roger Reserve and Jacques Selosse’s Initial.
Champagne’s appearance on this list is particularly noteworthy given the pressure the category has faced during the broader market correction. Evidence of support emerging in the Champagne 50 and sustained strength in several non-vintage labels could suggest that buyers are beginning to recognise value at current price levels.
Conclusion
While the broader market remains challenging, these results demonstrate that opportunities still exist for buyers willing to take a selective approach. Rather than waiting for a broad-based recovery, merchants may benefit from focusing on wines where transaction data already shows signs of improving demand and strengthening pricing.
In uncertain markets, trade activity can often provide the clearest signal. Monitoring where buyers are consistently returning may offer valuable clues about the next phase of market recovery.