The Whisky Cask Club announced on Thursday the launch of Asia’s first-ever Whisky Cask Fund, a unique platform which allows investors to invest in premium whisky casks at competitive rates. It is the only fund of its kind to be regulated by the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS). A historically long standing and continuous growth market, whisky casks have shown a consistent annual return of 15 to 20 percent, taking into consideration the imbalance between lack of supply of aged single malt Scotch whisky and growing global demand.
The Whisky Cask Fund offers accredited investors an alternative investment instrument and powerful portfolio diversification with low correlation to traditional asset classes. The whisky cask business is a highly liquid market, offering multiple exit strategies, such as the secondary market, auctions, and bottling. This is a tax-efficient fund with a targeted annual return of a 10 percent cash distribution and capital appreciation.
Said Alexander Knight, CEO & Co-Founder of Whisky Cask Club, the exclusive broker to the Whisky Cask Fund, “While other funds focus on whisky bottles, our whisky cask fund increases investors’ chances of profits on the sale of their assets since casks continually appreciate over time and are highly sought after by large whisky labels. Whisky only ages when it is in casks and has a natural time capitalisation – its value increases year-on-year with the ageing and rarefication of the barrels. As such, it shows steady growth over time as the underlying whisky matures and the number of casks decreases as they are sold and bottled for consumption. Moreover, as a physical underlying asset, it serves as a natural inflation hedge.”
The Whisky Cask Fund is actively managed by Blair Road Capital. Participation in the Fund requires a minimum investment sum of $50,000 and is available to accredited investors who meet the requirements set out by the MAS.
Ian Berclaz, Whisky Cask Fund Manager and Founder of Blair Road Capital, said, “The Fund employs targeted strategies with elements of active trading, which means that investors are betting on the whisky increasing in value over time because of its rare components or high-quality maturation prospects. It’s like trading stocks – you can buy and sell and hope that people buy back what you got from them. This is how you generate a lot of upside potential for investors.”
“Whisky is increasingly poised to become immensely profitable following the Knight Frank Luxury Investment Index, which anticipates a 540 percent asset performance of rare whiskies as an asset class in the next ten years. It outperforms other classes of luxury items like watches, classic cars, and jewellery,” added Berclaz.
Whisky Cask Club Partner, Matthew Lim, shared, “We chose to set up the Whisky Cask Club in Singapore because it’s perfectly positioned to capitalise upon the growing consumption of whisky in Asia. Singapore’s diverse population and the ease of doing business here make it an ideal location to jump on this amazing opportunity to invest in whisky casks.”
Additionally, investing in the Whisky Cask Fund comes with tax benefits. The casks are stored in Scotland in secure, fully insured bonded warehouses which can be physically visited.