By
Tom Gearing
This is the first CultX weekly market digest. Each week I go through what actually traded, find the two or three stories the numbers are telling, and explain them in plain English. No forecasts, no hype and no outside price feeds: just real trades between real buyers and sellers.
Every figure comes from the CultX platform, and every wine links to its page so you can open the chart and judge for yourself. Some weeks the story will be good news for holders and some weeks it won’t. I will say so either way.
Prices are in sterling, because trades on CultX settle in sterling. You can switch CultX to US dollars, euros, Hong Kong dollars, Singapore dollars or UAE dirhams to see every chart and price in your currency.
The week to 5 October was the busiest across the market we see by number of trades since April. September and early October as a whole ran about 9% above the summer on value and 11% on trades. More deals, not bigger ones (yet).
The week of 5 to 11 October came in below that peak but still in line with the average since the end of the summer. So the autumn pick-up looks intact.
The wine that keeps turning up in the data is a Champagne. Again.
A vintage of Taittinger’s Comtes de Champagne has been among the three most traded Champagnes in the market we see in 18 of the 26 weeks to 12 October. The 2006 alone traded 25 times in the 30 days to 12 October. So I went back through every trade in four vintages of it.
In the year to October 2025, the 2006, 2007, 2008 and 2011 traded 463 times between them. 418 of those trades cleared below market price, our own estimate of what a wine is worth in today’s market. Sellers were queueing to get out and paying for the privilege.
In the 30 days to 12 October the same four vintages traded 40 times. 36 cleared above market price. The prices themselves have moved too: the 2006’s typical trade was £490 in the third quarter of 2025 and £539 in the first 12 days of October 2026.
| Case of six, 12 October 2026 | Market price | 1 year | Trades, 30 days | Above | Below |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Comtes de Champagne 2006 | £518 | -0.1% | 25 | 22 | 3 |
| Comtes de Champagne 2007 | £514 | -2.8% | 8 | 8 | 0 |
| Comtes de Champagne 2008 | £762 | -2.4% | 2 | 2 | 0 |
| Comtes de Champagne 2011 | £453 | +3.1% | 5 | 4 | 1 |
| Cristal 2008 | £1,202 | +0.6% | 14 | 11 | 1 |
| Dom Pérignon 2008 | £901 | +3.9% | 9 | 4 | 4 |
The same turn shows in Cristal 2008. Between October 2025 and April 2026, 46 of its 61 trades cleared below market price. In the 30 days to 12 October, 11 of 14 cleared above.
Now look at the market price column. Three of the four Comtes vintages have a lower market price than a year ago, and the fourth is up 3%. The trades have moved and the reference price has not. Sellers have stopped conceding, buyers have stopped haggling, and the market price has yet to catch up.
It may be starting to. The 2006’s market price rose from £499 at the end of July to £518 at the end of September, a gain of 3.8%. That is what a turn would look like. It is also what a pre-Christmas bump looks like.
Two reasons for caution. Dom Pérignon 2008 has lost its nerve: of its 15 trades in the two months to mid-September, eight were above market price and one below, but the next nine split four and four. And on 10 October two trades in Comtes 2006 cleared at £486 and £481, 6% and 7% under market price. One busy month does not make a market.
The book matters too. The bid is the most a buyer will pay right now, and the offer is the least a seller will take. On 12 October the 2006’s best bid was £500 and its lowest offer £550, a gap of 10%. Anyone who has to sell tomorrow gets the bid.
White Burgundy is the other place where buyers are paying up, and the clearest case is the hill’s reference name. Five vintages of Bonneau du Martray’s Corton-Charlemagne, 2015 to 2019, traded on CultX between July and 12 October. In every one, the latest trades are higher than at the turn of the year.
The 2015 is the steepest. At the end of 2025 it was trading at £1,180 to £1,450 a case. In September 2026 two trades cleared at £1,800 and £1,840, the second matching its highest recorded trade, from May 2023. Its market price is up 10% in a year to £1,640, and the trades are running ahead of it.
The younger vintages say the same thing more quietly. The 2019 traded at £1,380 in the first quarter of 2026 and at £1,525 to £1,670 since July. The 2018 has gone from about £1,300 to £1,350 early in 2026 to £1,491 in September. The 2017 printed £1,690 in July, its best since spring 2024, and the 2016 traded at £1,600 in September after £1,420 in May.
Joseph Drouhin’s Corton-Charlemagne points the same way. Across the 2018, 2019 and 2020 it traded 13 times in the 90 days to 12 October, 11 above market price and none below. The 2018, which traded at £750 in June, cleared at £910 on 6 October. The 2019 and 2020 market prices are up 30.7% and 29.7% in a year.
Two caveats. Volumes are small: Bonneau’s five vintages traded 11 times between them from July, so each print matters. The 2014 and 2020 each traded once in 2026, both well below their market price. And the book is wide: on 12 October Drouhin 2018 had a best bid of £739 and a lowest offer of £908, a gap of 23%.
Biondi-Santi’s Brunello di Montalcino 2010 is a volatile wine. It has always printed across a wide range, so a single trade tells you little. The lowest trades tell you more.
Between November 2024 and January 2025 the bottom of the range was £400 to £415 a case. By the middle of 2025 the low trades were around £475. In March 2026 the lowest was £480. Since then nothing has traded below £500.
The typical trade has barely moved, between about £525 and £600 a quarter for two years. So this is not a rally. It is a market where sellers willing to take a low price are getting scarcer, and the range is narrowing from the bottom.
The market price, £572, is up 3.8% in a year, and most recent trades still clear below it. On 12 October the lowest offer was £549 and the best bid £540, one of the tightest books I looked at that week. The 2016 tells a similar story: it dipped to £614 and £640 at the turn of the month and was back at £711 and £748 on 9 October.
Domaine de la Janasse’s Châteauneuf-du-Pape Chaupin 2019 has had a rough two years on CultX. It mostly trades by the dozen, so I have halved the prices to six bottles. In mid-2024 six bottles changed hands for about £247. In spring 2026 the low was £120. The market price has followed the trades down, falling every month since December 2025 and 21.7% over the year to £156.
That is £26 a bottle for one of the best-reviewed wines of the vintage. Jeb Dunnuck and Wine Enthusiast both gave it 98 points, Jeff Leve 97, Decanter 95 and Wine Advocate 94. On CultX’s own fair value score it rates 99 out of 100, which means few wines look better value for their quality.
The buyers seem to agree. It traded 22 times between April and 12 October, against five times in the previous 21 months, and typical trades edged up from £135 in the spring to £144 in the summer. The latest, on 10 October, was £128, so the trades have yet to prove a floor. But a big fall followed by a sudden pick-up in trading usually means someone has spotted value. My test: if the next trades hold above £135, the floor is real. If they print under £120, I was wrong.
If a trade on the platform has surprised you, tell us. The best stories usually start with one odd trade.
Tom Gearing is co-founder and CEO of CultX.
This article is market commentary. It is not investment advice or a personal recommendation. All prices are CultX in-bond prices for the case size stated, as shown on the platform on 12 October 2026, and exclude fees, storage, duty and VAT. Product page images were captured on 19 October 2026 and include trades after the date of this issue. Past prices are not a guide to future prices, and fine wine can be slow to sell. CultX earns fees when wines trade on the platform. Past performance is not a guide to future returns. The value of wine investments can rise or fall. This analysis is provided for informational purposes and does not constitute personalised investment advice. Wines referenced may not be available for purchase on the CultX marketplace at all times.
