Posted on 04/28/2022 3:13:45 PM PDT by nickcarraway
The Macallan keeps its streak alive as the most coveted Scotch brand on the planet.
If you forget about a $20 bill in your coat pocket and find it 30 years laters, it's still worth $20. But the same cannot be said for rare whisky. If you forget about a cask of Scotch you bought for $6,275 in 1988, three decades later, it may be worth nearly $1.3 million.
A cask of The Macallan distilled in 1988 is laying claim to the record for most expensive whisky cask ever sold at auction after fetching $1,295,500 on Sunday from an unnamed American buyer bidding through the online auction site Whisky Hammer. The previous record — with an important caveat discussed below — was only a year old: A Macallan 30-year-old re-racked Sherry hogshead sold for $572,000 through Bonhams in 2021.
Adding intrigue to the story is how the cask landed at auction in the first place. It sold for a mere £5,000 (about $6,275 at the current conversion rate) after being filled on May 5, 1988, but the buyer apparently forgot they had purchased it. Held in bond by The Macallan for over three decades, the Scotch maker reminded the purchaser who, we'll assume, saw dollar signs like little tweety birds spinning around their head.
Whisky Hammer explains that the 374-liter refill butt could currently yield 534 bottles of 700 milliliters each — a number that also breaks Bonhams "per bottle" price record for a cask of whisky. This 1988 Macallan works out to $2,426 per bottle compared to the smaller Bonhams cask which still only sold for the equivalent of $2,200 per bottle.
"When this cask was listed in our auction, we knew it had the potential to make history," Daniel Milne, Whisky Hammer's founder and managing director, stated. "To come across a cask of this age, quality and size is extraordinary in itself, enhanced by the fact the liquid was distilled at The Macallan which is reflected in the global attention the cask has attracted."
As for the aforementioned caveat, this past October, a cask of Macallan 1991 sold for $2.33 million at an auction from VCL Vintners, but that cask also included a specially-commissioned NFT from artist Trevor Jones. How important was the NFT to the price of the cask? That's up for debate.
This latest cask sale, however, continues The Macallan's streak of leading the way in an ever-growing rare whiskey market by breaking and re-breaking records, including holding one of the most coveted: the most expensive single bottle ever sold.
That’s some expensive whisky.
I wonder if the winner of the auction wants me to come over and do a couple shots with him to celebrate.
My Granddaddy and my Great Uncle liked their whiskey aged about a month in the bottle. :)
Course that was in Tennessee and we were backwards.
Hardly
There’s no hootch worth that to me.
I’d just as soon by some of that NFT art they’ve been going on about lately.
Homemade out back?
“If you forget about a $20 bill in your coat pocket and find it 30 years later, it’s still worth $20.
Hardly”
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My initial thought was this writer may know food and drink, but has no clue about economics.
However, if you had a 20 gold coin from the 1800s, both then and now, that amount of gold would buy you a really nice suit.
Never understood Scotch and Whiskey, but to each his own, I suppose. Somebody brought a $200 bottle to my house and to me it might as well have been Jack Daniels, I wanted to mix it with coke, but I am sure it would have come to blows, so I didn’t
Then and now, most likely.
Gold price is heavily influenced by speculation and the buying power is far from fixed.
About 20 years ago, that ounce of gold dropped to nearly $300 USD.
About 40 years ago it was over $2000 and $300 gold in 20 years was unimaginable.
“Homemade out back?”
Homemade down in Hickman County Tennessee. Back up in the hollers. :)
Well, this is a little off subject, but when my Dad passed, he left me a bottle of Canadian Masterpiece blended whiskey, the seal on the cap has never been broken. It’s dated 1963. I may give it to my son-in-law at some point. It’s in a red presentation box, velvet lined. It’s not worth a lot of money, but it is cool to have. I’ll probably never open it…
So far, no takers.
Yes, but mine is dated 1963. I have the presentation case and even the plain cardboard slip cover that goes over it. $300! Cool…
Last Spring I was told I could get some good local ‘shine by a tree guy we were hiring to deal with an issue at a family homestead.
He was also a part time local cop.
I have to say I didn’t know how to deal with that. It was probably best I didn’t need to go back.
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