Rolex Record Prices at the Geneva Watch auctions, read my report here.....

[Philipp]

My May 2016 Geneva Watch Report

Last weekend the important watch auctions in Geneva happened again. The 4 auction houses sold together for CHF 60 million divided by market leader Phillips. 2 Sales of each 16 million, Christies 18.4 million, Antiquorum 5.7 million and what happened to Sotheby’s?!? only 4 million! Analyzing the results and the buyers, everything became very clear again. The vintage watch market is divided into 2 sections. One is where the new super collectors are tuning in picking up the Picasso’s and the Ferrari GTO’s under the vintage watches, boosting the attention and buying as investment and the others are the ‘normal’ collectors, who actually made this market in the last 25 years and buy out of passion.



Lots of interest has been given to the fact that vintage Rolex has gained enormous interest and prices gone through the roof to a level equally there where Patek Philippe is, at millions. At first it was something everybody connected to the vintage Rolex market was very proud of. Who ever thought it’s possible that a simple steel valjoux chrono with a ‘singer’ dial is selling, at first for nearly 500K and some years later, last Saturday at Phillips to be more precisely, fetching 2 million !! Now the dealers complain there’s nothing to buy in the market, the supply is drying up and buyers don’t sell anymore because they rather put more of their “sleeping” bankaccount money into vintage watches. Isn’t that exactly the logic result of “our” succes?? We all wanted the prices to go up, we all wanted the world to see how special our rare watches are and for years you could find great offers available to the market if you just paid 10-20 % more then the rest. This dramatically changed and prices for good quality are much higher than before because collecting vintage watches has become very populair. Logically everybody complains, the auction houses, the dealers and the collectors, they all want more…..



Let’s be honest, 2 million is for most people life changing. Many will never earn that much in their whole life. Spending it on a vintage Rolex is special, very special! The top 1 % of the market, the super rich that can easily afford adding another of such trophy to their collection, are keeping the auction houses alive. The 5 x vintage Rolex pictured above have now been sold for 7 million, whilst 4-6 years ago they costed nearly 2 million, making a return of 4 to 5 million profit, that is insane! Not many stocks, gold, bonds or real estate have such a performance. Thus many more rich enter the watch, diamond, car and art market making huge profits. Partly because money is not bring anything at the bank but merely because rare iconic design in great condition has been proven to be a save investment in rough times. Museums around the world are hugely popular, explaining the importance of their curated rarities to the public.









Just like with every investment, you need to look after with vintage watches as well. The more knowledge you have the better your result will be. You can not expect to step in the vintage watch market with money only, you need knowledge. And as it takes years to understand the subtle differences, collectors need to be realistic. Temper your expectations and start enjoying the watches in your “portfolio”. Take them out and wear them instead of storing another one to your safe box. While wearing it carefully you realize you didn’t bought a picture, instead you’ll better understand how important honest condition and matching patina is to a vintage watch.





The easiest way is to spend it at a reputable auction house, trusting their expertise and reputation. Logically you’ll be paying a premium because you choose not to do any effort finding it in the market with respectable dealers. Maybe you’re not aware about all little important details you need to know before you can buy an important watch. Anyways, buying at auctions is for end consumers. Out of the 100 people in the auction room, easily more then half is dealer. And of these 50plus dealers around 5 are only bidding during the sale. Many ask me if and what I buy at auction but let’s be honest, if it has come to the point where I need to step in, then the market has collapsed and I won’t even be sitting in the room 😉 I’m merely in Geneva to observe and see what my befriended dealers are doing. Who’s buying what and how the offers during the preview really look like. Very little private buyers are there to take active part of the sale. Most of them choose to use the phone to bid.



We come to the point now that I want to explain better in my following RPReports. We all have to realize there are 2 worlds of vintage watches. And as only a handful can effort to buy the best, most collectors have to settle for the second best. In other words: buy the best possible vintage watch which your budget allows you to! Don’t think that a 50-60 year old watch that’s still unpolished and crisp will fetch only 50% more then an average one. No, these time capsules sell now for 500% or more so it doesn’t make sense asking dealers if the watch is unpolished as it’s clearly not! Unpolished pieces do not need to be offered to the public as any dealers knows to find (using Instagram) that rich über collector that will pay him a huge premium immediately. You might have noticed that I’m already promoting different levels of rare watches at out Rolex Passion Market. I strongly believe that a honest white 1665 or gilt 1675 is a great investment. Not only money wise but more importantly, passion wise! Off course a nice and rare Newman or Big Crown is a must have but with reaching prices easily of 150-200K for common models and almost 400K for a good regular Oyster Newman, they are rightly so called grail watches.



Both collector watches, on the wrist. Up the 6241 is all brown, down the big eye Oyster PN has a brown track. Both raised like 50% increase in value after the recent results.



Compared to a modern watch, a vintage has so much more character and flair that you can only “win” buying one. Again I like to emphasize that the stuff you read from experts, “buy only the best“, is nonsense! Instead it should say “buy the best your budget allows you to and take lots of time to study the subject and market before you make a decision and burn your money”. The specialist dealer and their advise need to become important again instead of only focussing on the sales of auction houses. A dealer gets publicly butchered if he offers something thats not correct. There where auction houses are allowed to do everything. Even an important player as Phillips can print a vietnamese fake dial in their catalogue, while their mission statement is to only offer the best. Everybody makes mistakes and off course it got canceled from the sale but it takes a great dealer to warn them getting humiliated. The watch dealers are fighting for their existence since many years, putting their own money on the table. Except selling a watch a dealer shares his exclusive knowledge with his clients. The harsh reality is that a dealer is as good as his last deal, there where auction houses get much more credit. My advise is not only to the “super” collector but especially to the “normal” collector, focus on normal watches in good to great condition otherwise there’s there will nothing left to trade and that would kill the whole market. Buyers generally have unrealistic expectations at the moment, instead they should buy the best their wallet allows them to and not focus on grail watches…



Then, the upcoming collector brands like Longines, Universal, Movado etc didn’t explode in price this time and honestly I think that’s a great sign for our market! With some minor exceptions, generally the above mentioned brands are back on the ground with both feet and that’s great. A further explosion of the already crazy prices could make a sign of a upcoming bubble. However it turned out that the prices became stable for this trend. Not even Pucci’s Start Stop Reset sale changed this, those watches that where really exceptional, sold well above estimate, the rest was performing as predicted within the already steep estimated Aurel Bacs added to the show. It takes time to get to a new price level as everybody involved need to except times have changed….



Here are some of my impressions I can share with you. It was again great seeing so many cool guys, wish you all save trip back home!




See the rest of my article and all pictures over here at RPR:

--> http://rolexpassionreport.com/21447/...-watch-report/

Cheers, it was great seeing YOU!

Philipp

[texex91]

Fantastic as usual.

[S.C]

Wow fantastic analysis ! Thanks !!

[magnetic]

What an interesting and informative read.
Thank you so much for taking the time to write and share that with us.

[Oyster Al]

Awesome. Thank you. You are the man as always!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[arizonapaul]

Great reading, thanks for sharing it.

[Trurolexer]

Aweome!!!
Thanks for sharing

[el1125]

Love it! Excellent...

[Philipp]

MANY Thanks!! I updated my report….

With more results, remarks and some pictures...

-->http://rolexpassionreport.com/21447/...port-may-2016/



To get “things” into perspective, Christie’s sold today the 14.62 carats the largest Vivid Blue “Opperheimer” diamond” for CHF 56.8 million, which is about the same as the CHF 60million all auction house sold during the 4 important watch auctions…..

[travisb]

Thanks for the report. I was following this the day of the auction.
Impressive results to say the least.

[dddl]

Very, very interesting and informative, thank you...

[jerseyden]

Always an education to read your reports. Thank you

[rootbeer7]

absolutely fascinating report as ever. Looks my Great White won't be going anywhere for a while!

[TheRolexKingofLV]

Great thread...thanks for putting that together for us

[Tan]

Great article, thank you for sharing it.

[fusionstorm]

Thank you for posting, Philipp!

And thank you especially for this brutally honest guidance for vintage collectors:

Originally Posted by Philipp

it doesn’t make sense asking dealers if the watch is unpolished as it’s clearly not! Unpolished pieces do not need to be offered to the public as any dealers knows to find (using Instagram) that rich über collector that will pay him a huge premium immediately.