Targeted in crackdown, Moutai liquor is once again the toast of the town

A pricey Chinese potent liquor brand, sales of which had been depressed by President Xi Jinping’s anti-corruption campaign, has become extremely popular again - emptying distributors’ stocks and sending the share price of producer Kweichow Moutai to one new high after another.

The company’s flagship product, Feitian, with 53 per cent alcohol, is in short supply across the country as retailers, wholesalers and even consumers start to hoard bottled Baijiu as an inflation-proof investment - along with gold bars, property and stocks, according to a few dealers.

“Basically there are only buyers and no sellers [of Feitian],” said one dealer in Guangzhou, who had been trading liquor for a few years. In recent months, people have started hoarding the product with the expectation that demand for Moutai will expand again in coming years - when Xi has consolidated his power and the movement to tame public spending on lavish dinners has eased, said the dealer, who declined to be named.

The price of Moutai is soaring. One dealer told the Post that the real market price for a bottle of 2014 Moutai Feitian can reach well above 2,000 yuan, almost double that of a year ago. A bottle produced in 2003 is priced at above 4,000 yuan.

Moutai had sought to punish more than 100 distributors for “irregularly raising prices” or hoarding in the last two months, but the move only fed the “black market” boom.