As a sponsor of the event, alongside organisations including Goldman Sachs Asset Management, J.P. Morgan Asset Management and Barclays Investment Bank, Speyside Capital supported a day of discussion and networking focused on the evolving priorities of family wealth.

The programme explored key themes including global wealth trends, direct investing, succession planning, portfolio strategy and the growing complexities of managing wealth across generations.

In his latest article for Forbes Business Council, Speyside Capital CEO Paul Kopec explores this question, looking at what investors seek during periods of uncertainty and where whisky might fit within the broader diversification conversation.

Recent research from Schroders found that more than half of UK advisers surveyed had adjusted client portfolios in response to the geopolitical environment, with many adopting a more defensive approach.

Gold remains the traditional benchmark. However, the characteristics behind its long-standing role within portfolios also raise interesting questions about other tangible assets, including Scotch whisky.

Whisky is not a substitute for gold. It has distinct considerations around liquidity, valuation, selection and time horizons. However, as wealth managers and advisers continue to explore diversification beyond traditional markets, its role within the wider alternative asset landscape is becoming increasingly relevant.

In the Forbes article, Paul explores these similarities and differences, the fundamentals underpinning Scotch whisky, and why understanding the characteristics of the asset is essential when considering its place within a diversified portfolio.

Read the full article on Forbes →

The United States has announced a series of new tariffs affecting trading partners around the world, including a proposed 50% tariff on many Canadian alcoholic beverages. At almost the same time, tariffs on Scotch whisky were removed, restoring zero-tariff trade with Scotland’s largest export market.

What, if anything, could these developments mean for the Scotch whisky market?

It is too early to draw firm conclusions. However, recent events provide a useful opportunity to consider how global trade policy can influence internationally traded products, and why geographic diversification remains an important characteristic of the Scotch whisky industry.

Why market concentration matters

Recent events have highlighted the risks of relying too heavily on a single export market.

Diversification is a principle familiar to every investment professional. Whether applied to an asset portfolio or an export market, reducing reliance on a single source of demand can improve resilience over the long term.

According to Spirits Canada, approximately 93% of Canada’s spirits exports are destined for the United States. That level of dependence on a single export market leaves the sector particularly exposed when trade policy changes.

The same principle can be seen across many globally traded industries. Where demand is concentrated in one country or region, businesses are naturally more exposed to changes in political, economic or trade policy.

Concentration creates risk, while diversification creates resilience.

Much of the discussion has focused on reduced tariffs for Scotch whisky entering India. While that will undoubtedly be significant, the broader implications for premium Scotch, casks and the wider whisky ecosystem may prove equally important over the coming years.

For Speyside Capital, the significance of India within the premium Scotch market is not a new story. Since 2024, we have been actively engaging with the market and observing trends that suggested India’s role in premium whisky was set to grow well beyond simple consumption.

Importantly, the significance of the agreement extends beyond bottled Scotch. As duties reduce over time, India becomes a more accessible market for premium and rare Scotch expressions, creating opportunities across the wider whisky ecosystem, from casks and collectors to bottlers, distributors and premium brand owners.

The agreement could also fundamentally reshape the relationship between Indian whisky companies and Scotland itself. Beyond making Scotch more accessible, a stronger long-term commercial relationship may encourage greater strategic investment into Scottish whisky production through acquisitions, joint ventures, contract distilling, bottling operations and other forms of direct participation. For ambitious Indian distillers and bottlers, Scotland may increasingly be viewed not only as a source of supply, but as a strategic partner in long-term growth.

This comes at a time when India is already establishing itself as one of the world’s most important premium whisky markets. While blended whisky continues to dominate overall consumption, some of the strongest growth is taking place in premium and single malt categories, with increasing demand for rarity, provenance and quality.

Earlier this year, Speyside Capital worked with ABD Maestro on The Collective, a rare 34-year-old expression launched by Bollywood star Ranveer Singh. The release reflected the growing appetite within India for scarce and highly differentiated whisky experiences.

Taken together, the two developments begin to create a clearer commercial route between three of the world’s most important whisky markets: Scotland, India and the United States.

That matters because each market plays a very different role:

• Scotland remains the centre of global whisky heritage and premium production.
• India is the world’s largest whisky-consuming market and an increasingly important source of capital.
• The United States remains the deepest profit pool for premium spirits globally.

Historically, those markets have operated adjacent to one another rather than as part of a connected system. That may now be starting to change.

More Than an Export Story

The assumption has generally been that lower Indian tariffs simply mean more Scotch exports into India. That will happen, but the longer-term implications may be more significant for Indian spirits companies themselves.

Several Indian spirits groups are now operating at a scale where greater involvement in Scotch production starts to make strategic sense. Companies such as Radico Khaitan and Allied Blenders & Distillers are building stronger premium portfolios, investing more heavily in international positioning, and looking beyond the domestic market.

In that environment, owning production assets in Scotland becomes more than a prestige exercise, but a way to secure long-term stock access, control supply, strengthen premium positioning and build globally recognised brands with genuine Scotch provenance.

That could mean:

• acquiring distilleries
• investing in maturing cask inventory
• securing production partnerships
• building premium export brands at origin

In whisky, ownership of production still matters enormously, particularly at the premium end of the market.

Why the U.S. Changes the Equation

India will continue to premiumise over time, but structurally it remains dominated by blended whisky. The real international opportunity sits in the United States.

For premium Single Malt Scotch, the U.S. remains one of the industry’s most attractive markets, particularly for brands built around heritage, authenticity and production origin. That is where the broader trade backdrop becomes important.

If Indian companies can access Scotch production more efficiently while Scotland retains stable routes into the U.S. market, a clearer international growth model starts to emerge:

• Scotland as the production and ageing base
• India as the capital and long-term demand market
• The U.S. as the premium export opportunity

That is not a dynamic the whisky industry has historically seen at this scale.

A Different Kind of Indian Participation in Scotch

Indian companies have spent decades acquiring and scaling international businesses across industries ranging from steel to pharmaceuticals and automotive manufacturing.

What has been more limited is meaningful ownership within Scotch itself. Partly because distillery assets are scarce, ageing cycles are long, and relationships still matter enormously in transactions and supply.

However, conditions are shifting. Independent distilleries continue to require capital and international route-to-market capability, while Indian spirits groups are becoming larger, more internationally minded and increasingly premium-focused.

Against that backdrop, deeper Indian involvement in Scotch no longer feels unlikely. It feels commercially rational. 

The Strategic Shift

What changes now is not demand for Scotch, but who may increasingly control parts of its future value chain.

India is currently one of the fastest-growing premium whisky markets globally, and some of the strongest growth within whisky is happening in the single malt and premium-plus segments.

Affluent Indian consumers increasingly view single malt as a lifestyle and status category, gifting has moved premium, collectors are emerging and HNIs/UHNIs are beginning to explore cask ownership and exclusive bottlings.

The India–UK trade agreement is likely to accelerate this further because Scotch import duties are expected to progressively reduce from 150% toward 40% over time.

That shift will not happen overnight. Scotch remains a tightly held industry with finite stock, long ageing cycles and relatively few available assets. But the direction of travel is becoming clearer.

India has long had the market scale, and increasingly the capital, to play a larger role in global whisky. What it now appears to have, for the first time, is a clearer commercial corridor linking Scotch production, Indian demand and U.S. premium market access.

And if that trend accelerates, the next phase of global whisky competition may involve far more Indian ownership in Scotland than the Scotch industry has historically been used to.