New figures show that investing in certain classic cars produced strong results last year - especially when compared with average gains for holding global equities, or fine wines.

The market for classic cars fared better in terms of price gains than was the case for fine wines last year, and certainly left mainstream equity markets in the slipstream, according to indices of performance from UK-based Historic Automobile Group Limited, or HAGI.

The HAGI Top 50 benchmark index rose 2.86 points (0.91 per cent) in December, ending 2015 with a gain of 16.57 per cent and reaching a new index high at 317.38, the organisation said today. By comparison, Liv-ex, the online exchange tracking prices fetched at auctions for fine wines, says that its Liv-ex Fine Wine 100 benchmark of auction deals was down 0.1 per cent in 2015, and has fallen 29.15 per cent over the past five years. The narrower Liv-ex Fine Wine 50 measure is down 33.96 per cent over five years and fell 0.73 per cent last year. As far as equities are concerned, the MSCI World Index of developed countries’ shares fell by 0.87 per cent in 2015 (in dollars).

Such performance could continue to generate a buzz around “passion investments” such as classic cars, although the liquidity of this market varies considerably when compared to mainstream asset classes such as stocks and bonds. (To see a Taylor Wessing guest article about classic cars, see here.)

HAGI said that marques other than Porsche and Ferrari (HAGI Top ex P&F Index) fell in December (-2.38 per cent) but showed the best growth in 2015, up 20.85 per cent. The HAGI P Index (classic Porsche) rose 19.81 per cent through the year and was up 9.8 per cent in December (month-on-month). 

Ferrari (HAGI F) underperformed its long-term annual average and managed a gain of 10.95 per cent in 2015; it was up 0.7 per cent from a month earlier in December. The Mercedes-Benz Classic Index (MBCI) gained 7.57 per cent year-on-year and was up 3.24 per cent in December.