The 2005 Bordeaux wine-futures frenzy widened last week when a dozen major chateaux finally added their prices to others already released. Increases are from 25% to as much as 325% above last year's prices, writes Bloomberg's Elin McCoy. But even if 2005 Bordeaux is a legend in the making, is it worth buying now?

The wines are still aging in barrel and won't be delivered in bottle until spring or autumn 2008. Prices are the highest ever. I recently experienced severe sticker shock at an offer of third-growth Chateau Palmer for US$249 a bottle. For US$170 I could buy the superb 2000 and drink it tonight.

"The prices are simply too high for the investment potential to be there," says wine adviser Mark Golodetz of Sleepy Hollow Wine Co. "I'd buy wines that are in short supply, but overall there's little incentive to buy now."

In five vintages of the 1990s, for example, those who shelled out for futures could have bought many of the same wines when they were finally released in bottle for exactly the same price they'd paid two years earlier. In other words, buying futures then was a poor investment. The same seems true now, at least for short-term profits.

Yet plenty of wine buffs are buying 2005s anyway.

"We sold one million pounds of futures every day this week," says UK merchant Farr Vintners' Stephen Browett. "For the top wines, demand is 10 times our supply."

As many as 500 cases of second-growth Cos d'Estournel (1,120 pounds a case) were purchased in one morning, and Browett is pondering how to divvy up 300 cases of second-growth Leoville-Barton among 1,000 eager buyers. Great vintages have a way of convincing you that such purchases are rational.

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