In these trying times investors could be forgiven for hitting then bottle, but it seems for some buying fine wines has been their route to investment success. In the first half of 2011 the FTSE100 was outperformed by a factor of 14.

Fine wine has been seen as a potentially vigorous investment. Even if the price does not go in the direction you want, you can at least drink the wine. Of wines that that are used as an investment, Bordeaux is favoured.

Successful use of wine as an asset class for investment depends on expert selection. A large part of what will determine the price of a wine is the subjective whims of certain influential critics. It is not all down to this however, so experts will be able to advise you based on other more measurable factors such as supply and demand.

Those who have taken to wine investing haver certainly done well so far this year. They have seen their investment grow by almost 14%.

An argument could be made that percentage gains such as these and the domination of a handful of classified growths are anything but indicative of a healthy market for fine wine.

Furthermore, if you look back a few years, you’ll see that these same wines crashed far worse than any of the stock indexes. 14% return now but unbelievably volatile, and entirely reliant on the subjective whims of a few critics, Parker being the pre-eminent Bordeaux critic. One area of debate in wine investment at the moment is what happens when Parker dies…

Like most things you can put your money into this is something that you should go into with your eyes open. Your bog standard financial advisor might not know much about this asset class, but some banks such as HSBC Coutts have specialists for wine investments.

While the controversy around Bitcoin continues, there has been a significant new development that suggests the nascent electronic currency certainly has plans to stay.

The Bitcoin app is now available from the Android app store. What it does is enable your Android powered smart phone to act as a digital wallet for your Bitcoins. What is interesting about this is that it allows users to swap their Bitcoins directly with other users by displaying a QR code on the screen that can be scanned.

Although Bitcoins are currently very much a niche concern, they could have advantages. There are no fees associated with making a Bitcoin payment.

Bitcoins have recently been targeted by malware, with thefts of Bitcoins worth many thousand dollars being reported. In addition the currency has been extremely volatile, with the value of a Bitcoin falling from a high of $17 to under $1 in an instant.

This very volatility means that there is the potential to make money speculating, if you have the nerve to gamble on something which (be honest with yourself) you don’t really understand.