July, 23, 2014 Treasury Wine Estates has small win against shareholder class action litigator

(TheAge) - The Supreme Court of Victoria has fired a broadside at the business model of one-man shareholder litigator Mark Elliott, arguing the former partner with Minter Ellison had likely set up his Melbourne City Investments (MCI) vehicle for the purpose of launching class action law suits to ge...

July, 22, 2014 FBI hunts winemaker linked to neo-nazi site

(TDB) - A Californian winemaker alleged to be behind an anti-Semitic website is thought to have fled to Canada after the FBI issued a warrant for his arrest. Béla Varga, owner of the kuruc.info domain, is charged with stalking and harassing an attorney in May who had obtained a subp...

July, 22, 2014 Napa’s Quixote Winery Sold to Chinese-Owned Firm For Approximately $29 Million

(WineSpectator) - Carl Doumani has sold his Quixote winery in Napa Valley’s Stags Leap District to Jinta Vineyards and Winery, a Chinese-owned private firm registered in the United States. Jinta paid close to the asking price of $29 million, according to Doumani. The deal is the latest of a ...

July, 22, 2014 China Is Brewing Wine From Tiger Bones

(TheDailyBeast) - Despite official bans on the sales of tiger bones, wine made from exotic animal remains thrives on China’s black market. From an old cardboard box, Li Wen drew a clear glass bottle filled with a dark brown liquid. The yellowed label indicated that it was brewed decades...

July, 22, 2014 New law allows California students to taste wine

(SFGate) - College students under the age of 21 will be allowed to drink alcohol in class, as long as they're enrolled in a beer brewing or winemaking program and they refrain from swallowing, under legislation signed Monday by Gov. Jerry Brown. The so-called sip and spit law, set to take effect...

July, 22, 2014 Malibu the Latest Official U.S. Wine Region

(Wine-Searcher) - Two new U.S. winegrowing areas are officially recognized including Malibu Coast, extending from the famous Mulholland Drive. The U.S. federal government formally established the Malibu Coast as an American Viticultural Area on Friday – three years after the process began....

July, 22, 2014 What’s in your ‘wine vinegar’

(PD) - When you buy a bottle of wine vinegar in a supermarket, do you know what’s in it? This question has plagued me, off and on, for 20 years. Every time I try to investigate it, I get nowhere. More about this stone-walling later. My first assumption was that anything called “wi...

July, 22, 2014 France: Rhone wine co-ops fighting 'supply war' with negociants

(Decanter) - Tensions are running high in the Rhone Valley with negociants and cooperative cellars clashing over the advance purchase of grapes for the 2014 harvest. A letter was sent in early July to all cooperative cellars in the region, signed by the Cotes du Rhone winemakers’ union, to...