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By Oliver Catchpole
Published: 16 July, 2026
Liv-ex has released its H2 2026 Wine Market Report, which suggests that US buyers have accounted for a growing share of purchasing in Q2, tending to purchase wines in its Fine Wine 1000 index above market price.
This additional engagement comes after continued stabilisation of the market, with, on average, major fine wine indices becoming less volatile.
There remains a complex outlook for the fine wine market, with more component vintages of the Fine Wine 1000 falling rather than rising over Q2, but the risers gains (at 5.2% on average) outweighing the fallers losses (4.1% on average).
Tom Burchfield, head of decision intelligence at Liv-ex, explained: “While Q2 2026 was more active than 2025’s tariff-dominated Q2, top-line price stability has not yet translated into enough confidence (or demand) for overall trade levels to rise.”
The wine investment platform said that the US stands out as the one region whose purchasing has increased so far in 2026, with US buyers taking a 26.9% share of purchase value in Q2.
This is up from 23.3% in Q1, and well above the 2025 average of 20.7%.
Liv-ex explained that this is occurring as participants across the US supply chain work out how to navigate tariffs, and as stock deplete naturally over time.
Additionally, for wines in the Fine Wine 1000, buyers from the US purchased at an average of 1.1% above market price, up from 0.03% in Q1.
Live-ex said that if US buying continues to increase over H2, with purchase prices at or above market value, there will be further increases to price stability.
Asian buyers have taken a backseat so far this year, with local trade prices continuing to soften. This is partially an impact of the US-Iran war, with shipping costs rising by up to 60% in some instances.
A persistent trend has been the divergent outlook between different vintages, with Liv-ex using Bordeaux as an example.
With the exception of young 2022s, pre-2017 Bordeaux is on average much more resilient – tending to find its floor earlier.
Notably, while Bordeaux En Primeur dominated Q2, it drove much less revenue than in the past, as Harpers reported. UK members Liv-ex surveyed said that sales value was about the same as 2024.
The releases that did make sense, according to Liv-ex, were below the current market price for all back vintages of a similar quality, while those back vintages were now showing stability – or even rising.
The investment platform concluded that the outlook “remains better than it was 12 months ago”, expecting continued stability into H2.
Image credit – phideg on Pixabay
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