Fintech Vint helps users invest in exclusive wines and spirits
- Vint is a fintech that offers fractional shares of high-end wines and spirits.
- Nick King and Patrick Sanders founded the startup in 2019.
- Vint used this 13-page pitch deck to raise a $5 million seed round.
This fintech wants to make investing in wine and spirits accessible to everyone by creating a new asset class.
The market for investing in wine and spirits is “highly inefficient” and “largely inaccessible,” Vint CEO and co-founder Nick King told Insider. But wines and spirits have a strong history of good returns and tend to hold their value despite what happens in the wider financial markets.
That’s why King and his co-founder and CTO, Patrick Sanders, launched Vint in June 2019 as a marketplace to enable both accredited and non-accredited investors to buy shares in fine wine and spirits collections.
“What we’re trying to do is create a financial asset class. We’re not a wine company, we’re a fintech company, and that’s the mission,” King said. “You should look at wine and spirits just like you look at stocks, bonds and real estate when it comes to building a portfolio.”
Vint closed a $5 million seed round led by Montage Ventures in December 2022. In October 2021, the startup raised $1.7 million in a pre-seed round. King declined to share Vint’s valuation. The new funding comes as venture capital is expected to continue to decline this year.
Vint’s co-founders Nick King and Patrick Sanders
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On Vint, a $200,000 collection of 500 bottles of Bordeaux wine, for example, would sell for 2,000 shares at $100 each. This allows retail investors to effectively diversify their portfolio without having to buy a single bottle that can cost thousands.
The minimum investment is one share, which usually costs between $50 and $100.
An important selling point for Vint is the fact that all shares are securitized by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
“We’ve found that the more expensive the asset, the stronger the return,” King said. “So to offer investors the highest caliber of assets, we see this fraction as the best way.”
From Robinhood users to hedge fund traders
Vint’s users range from mom-and-pop investors to IRA managers, hedge fund traders and tech executives who invest over six figures on the platform. Retail investors appreciate Vint’s accessibility, while high-net-worth investors appreciate the trust factor that comes with SEC accreditation, according to King.
While some users appreciate Vint’s ability to give them access to exclusive wines and spirits, others simply see fintech as a way to invest in another financial asset. Their biggest concern is the returns and the lack of correlation to wider markets.
Vint will use its seed round funds to expand its team, better manage data and offer more products. A new hire included hiring Adam Lapierre as Vint’s director of wine. Lapierre is a Certified Master of Wine, one of only 57 in the United States to hold the title.
Part of the fintech’s plans include consolidating fragmented industry data to help investors make more data-driven decisions about the wines and spirits they invest in. Vint also plans to explore more collections, different themes and new products, such as bourbon.
“Financial innovation, particularly within investor portfolios, doesn’t happen in good times,” King said. “Losing money is painful. Loss aversion tells us that losing money is far more painful than making money feels good, so it spurs a call to action from investors or advisors.
