Auctioneers predict 'world record' for rare whisky

One of the world's rarest single malt whiskies is predicted to become the most expensive bottle ever sold when it is auctioned next month.

The Macallan 1926 Fine and Rare 60 Year Old is one of only 14 of its kind.

It is expected to beat the current world record hammer price of £1.2m, which is held by a Macallan from the same original bottling batch.

The bottle leads the sale of the second half of one the world's largest private whisky collections to go to auction.

The "Perfect Collection' was amassed over decades by former US bottling magnate Richard Gooding, who died in 2014.

The first part of the collection - more than 1,900 bottles - made more than £3.2m when it was auctioned online last year.

The remaining 1,900 lots were due to go on sale last April, but Perth-based seller Whisky Auctioneer pulled the auction after it was hit by a cyber attack. The company later reported that no data was compromised and the issues had been resolved.

Whisky Auctioneer founder Iain McClune said: "The 1926 has only been at auction once in recent years and at that time it broke the world record for the most expensive bottle of whisky ever sold, and we're hoping that will happen again.

"The second part of the collection we expect to sell for several million pounds.

"We've got whisky dating back to 1921 - 100 years ago - and others from closed distilleries in Scotland that have rarely been seen before at auction."

Who was Richard Gooding?

Richard Gooding's grandfather, James A Gooding, started the Pepsi Cola Bottling Company of Denver in 1936.

His father took over the business before Richard himself became owner and chief executive in 1979.

He sold the company to PepsiCo in 1988.

Mr Gooding regularly travelled from his home in the US to Scotland with his pilot to source special bottles at auctions and distilleries before his death in 2014.

His collection was housed in what Mr Gooding called his "pub" - a dedicated room in his Colorado family home that was specially designed to showcase his whiskies.

Angus MacRaild, an expert on old and rare whiskies, said: "There's never been a collection of this volume, breadth and scale that has come up for auction ever.

"There's a good chance the Macallan 1926 Fine and Rare will break the world record for the most expensive whisky sold. For completists, particularly of Macallan, it's the pinnacle bottle."

Mr MacRaild said among the bottles on offer is what he considers to be one of the greatest ever - a 12-year-old Largiemeanoch from Bowmore Distillery on Islay.

"Having tasted it myself it's one of the most exquisite examples of Scotch whisky ever bottled and a good illustration of the kind of taste Mr Gooding had," he said.