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According to Reuters,
the London-based Antique Wine Company reported on Saturday that the anonymous
Beijing-based entrepreneur bought a mix of vintages of Romanée
Conti (DRC), considered to be one of the world's most exclusive wines
of which only 450 cases are produced annually.
The mix consists of 12 bottles of Romanée Conti
1978, 2 bottles each of the 1961, 1966, 1996 and 2003 and single bottles
of the 1981, 1990, 1992, 1995, 1999, 2001 and 2002.
"It is the highest price that has ever been achieved
for a single lot," says Managing Director Stephen Williams of Antique,
adding, "I don't think he has bought this as an investment, he has
bought it to drink."
Earlier, the same client had spent $60,000 for a case
of 1982 Chateau Pétrus, his biggest single buy.
Apparently a fan of Burgundy's fine feminine wines,
Williams believes that in the past, the Chinese have been drawn to the
magnificent but simplistic qualities of the wines from the great chateaux
of Bordeaux.
He adds, "Our leap in sales of Domaine de la Romanée
Conti to China this year in particular indicates a broadening of their
fine wine education and appreciation of the more complex wines of Burgundy."
Buyers usually pay the highest prices for extremely special
bottles. For example, wines that came out of Thomas Jefferson's cellar
fetch very high prices. Since during that period in the late eighteenth
century wine bottles were not labelled, the former US President poured
the premium wines he imported in casks from Europe into bottles etched
with his initials.
In 2006, the most expensive bottle of white wine in
the world was a regular-sized bottle of Chateau d'Yquem 1787, sold for
just under $100,000. Pierre Lurton, President of Yquem had recently informed
delWine that the company still maintained a few bottles of this historic
vintage in their cellar.
It is a matter of time before the ultra-rich in India
get into the habit of buying wines En primeur or in lots and auctions
like this.The spare cash is there but the knowledge and penchant are on
their way. They just need to be convinced that this is like buying fine
art.
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