'A great day for investors'?

Yesterday saw the launch in London of the Wine Investment Association (WIA), an attempt at a self-regulatory body for the wine investment business.

Such an organisation is long overdue, according to its four founder members Hugo Rose MW, Peter Shakeshaft, Adrian Lenagan and David Jackson, all of whom work in wine investment.

As Rose put it, up to now the industry's response to problems such as customers losing their wines has amounted to little more than hand-wringing. He added that the recently published Wine and Spirit Trade Association guidelines on wine investment were helpful but 'unambitious'.

Hence the establishment of...