Argentina’s significant Malbec inventory represents an opportunity for the international buyer seeking large, high-quality volumes of the varietal. Pricing on the market has been stable at its elevated, uncompetitive level for the past two months, though potentially negotiable.
Pricing in general remains stable. Malbec continues to constitute the majority of stock, with high-quality supplies available in large volumes. Some small pockets of high-quality white varietal wine – Chardonnay, Pinot Grigio – have been popping up on the market intermittently, mainly due to wineries readjusting their case-good needs. There has been some international buyer activity on these white varietals. The shipping of wines out of Argentina has been running relatively smoothly in comparison with other countries.
Export data
With more than 25.3 million liters, Malbec represents 57% of the varietal wines exported in bulk from Argentina between January to September 2022.
Today, according to the prices published by CIATTI, the value of Standard Malbec is between 1.10 and 1.30 USD FOB/liter.
The ranking of bulk Malbec buyers has remained stable in the last year: both in terms of value and volume, the top five buyers are the United Kingdom, the United States, Germany, France and Sweden. In Latin America, the most important buyer for Argentina is Peru, which this year ranked eighth in volume and ninth in value.
Harvest watch
Argentina’s growing areas have experienced good winter weather, with cold temperatures, rainfall, and snowpack laid down in the mountains. Conditions appear conducive to a positive growing season, though – with spring imminent – the frost risk must first be safely navigated.
Sustained growth
The area cultivated with Malbec grew by 31% in the 2012/2021 period and the variation from last year compared to 2020 was also positive, 2%, to total, in 2021, 46,366 hectares of vineyards with Malbec throughout the Argentine territory.
Mendoza concentrates 85% of the hectares with Malbec, followed by San Juan with 6%, Salta 4%, La Rioja 2%, Neuquén 1% and the rest of the provinces that gather 2% of the total.
In 2012, the hectares of Malbec concentrated 17% of the total cultivated in Argentina, while 10 years later, in 2021, 22% of the total cultivated with vines corresponds to our flagship grape.
To have an idea of the number of hectares cultivated with Malbec, we compare it with other red varieties: while the Malbec grape concentrated 22% of Argentine hectares in 2021, Bonarda had 8% and Cabernet Suavignon 7%. Regarding white grapes, Pedro Giménez and Torrontés group 4% respectively and Chardonnay 3%.
