U.S. Buyers Lifted Their Share of Fine Wine Purchases to 26.9% in the Second Quarter

Liv-ex, the London-based fine wine exchange, said Wednesday that the fine wine market showed signs of stabilizing in the first half of 2026, helped by a return of U.S. buyers and firmer pricing for older Bordeaux vintages.

The company’s latest market report found that U.S. buyers accounted for 26.9% of purchase value in the second quarter, up from 23.3% in the first quarter and above the 2025 average of 20.7%. Liv-ex said that shift made the United States the main buying geography to post a clear increase this year, at a time when overall trading activity remains subdued and merchants continue to act cautiously.

The report points to a market that is steadier than it was a year ago, though not yet fully recovered. Major fine wine indices have broadly stabilized, but performance still varies sharply by producer and vintage. Within the Liv-ex Fine Wine 1000 index, which tracks 1,000 wines from around the world, more component vintages fell in value than rose during the second quarter. Even so, the average gain among rising wines was 5.2%, compared with an average decline of 4.1% among those that fell.

Tom Burchfield, Liv-ex’s head of decision intelligence, said in the report that second-quarter activity was stronger than in the same period last year, when tariffs weighed heavily on trade, but that price stability alone had not yet restored enough confidence to lift total volumes. He said top-line stability had still not translated into sufficient demand for overall trade levels to rise.

The stronger U.S. presence also had an effect on pricing. Liv-ex said American buyers paid an average of 1.1% above market price for wines in the Fine Wine 1000 during the quarter, compared with 0.03% above market price in the first quarter. That premium suggests U.S. demand is helping support prices in a market where many participants remain reluctant to build inventory.

The report describes a trade environment still shaped by caution. Bordeaux En Primeur remained the dominant feature of the second quarter, though Liv-ex said it no longer drives revenue as it once did. Among surveyed U.K. members, sales value from the 2025 En Primeur campaign was roughly flat compared with the 2024 campaign. Merchants are still operating with limited risk appetite and are generally not buying heavily for stock, leaving private collectors as a key force behind demand.

That dependence on collectors has made the market more sensitive to broader economic and geopolitical concerns. Liv-ex said any event that causes collectors to worry about their future wealth can quickly affect buying decisions. The report also noted that shipping costs rose by as much as 60% in some cases after the start of the Iran war, adding pressure to international trade flows and weighing on demand in some regions.

Asian buyers were less active this year, according to Liv-ex. While global benchmark prices have stabilized, local trade prices in Asia have continued to soften, with some large discounted transactions taking place privately. That combination has reduced the region’s influence on headline market activity compared with earlier periods.

One of the clearest trends in the report is a widening gap between older and younger vintages, especially in Bordeaux. With the exception of some young 2022 wines, Bordeaux produced before 2017 has generally proved more resilient and appears to have found a price floor sooner than more recent vintages. Liv-ex said this pattern has become increasingly important for release strategies in En Primeur because successful new offers tend to depend not only on attractive release pricing but also on stable or rising values for comparable back vintages.

Château Lafite Rothschild was cited as an example of that trend. Liv-ex said several high-quality Lafite vintages released after 2014 have posted modest price gains since the start of the year, helping reinforce confidence in both older stock and newer releases. In trading by value during the first half of 2026, Lafite ranked as the most traded wine on the exchange, followed by Sassicaia and Pétrus.

The report suggests that demand is becoming more concentrated around a relatively small group of highly traded labels rather than spreading evenly across the market. That concentration has created what Liv-ex described as pockets of opportunity, where certain wines are managing to combine price gains with sustained trading activity even as broader turnover remains muted.

For producers, merchants and collectors, that means the market is no longer moving in one direction across all categories. Instead, buyers are showing greater selectivity by region, brand and vintage. Older Bordeaux appears to be benefiting most from that shift, while younger wines and less established labels face a tougher environment.

Liv-ex said conditions heading into the second half of the year look better than they did 12 months ago. If U.S. buying continues to grow and American buyers keep purchasing at or above market price, the exchange said further price stability is likely. Still, it warned that confidence remains fragile and that fine wine continues to trade in a market defined more by caution than momentum.