Passion assets
Collectible assets held both for enjoyment and as a wealth strategy: art, watches, classic cars, wine, whisky, jewelry or luxury handbags.
Passion assets are the collectible goods that the wealthy hold both for enjoyment and as a wealth diversification tool. The sector's benchmark index, published by Knight Frank, tracks ten categories, including art, watches, classic cars, wine, whisky, jewelry, colored diamonds and luxury handbags. The ultra-wealthy devote a substantial share of their wealth to them, of the order of 17%. These markets share traits that set them apart from classical financial assets: low liquidity, high transaction and custody costs, expert-based rather than continuous valuation, and pronounced volatility driven by fashion effects. For insurance purposes they fall within the specie class and pose the problem of the artwork: the price of an asset of desire moves with the market, yesterday's agreed value can diverge sharply from today's market value, and policies need regular revaluation.
A family office insures a collection mixing watches, wine and Hermès handbags. Between 2023 and 2025 rare whisky corrects sharply while handbags advance: the insurer requires an annual revaluation of agreed values to track these diverging paths.
Follow the research
One letter a week. First, the week's underwriting note, when one is published: a dated, argued decision, signed by Paul Bernardski. Then what the observatory published on cyber risk, political risk and insurance. No account, no tracking.
No spam, one-click unsubscribe, no data ever sold.