The best trading conditions are when the volume of transactions is high and prices are predictable.

Buyers often point the finger at grey market dealers for having “driven prices up” during the post-pandemic boom and making a fortune during that time.

However, the truth is that, among us longer standing dealers, we were no more responsible than anyone else for the spectacular rise and fall.

At the time, we paid market price for stock and made almost the same margins we’re making now. If anyone, it was the flippers who benefited more than anyone, not the dealers.

Many a dealer lost a fortune when prices started to fall, so I think we’re all quite grateful that we’re now outlaying an awful lot less to buy the same stock, with little chance of us getting caught out by price volatility.

“The most popular Rolex models in January and February were from the GMT and Oyster Perpetual ranges, with noticeably more significant demand for Pepsis in light of a clear lack of supply and a rumoured discontinuation on the horizon”

Eddie Bloom

Thankfully, 2024 seems to be off to a flying start, and we seem to be through the worst of the storm, with bucket loads of confidence coming back into the market and a few surprises from certain brands in terms of unexpected demand.

As usual, Rolex is topping the transactional volume scales, accounting for a whopping 84% of sales for Bloombar in both January and February of this year, with the runners up being Patek Philippe, JLC and then Cartier.

The most popular Rolex models sold were from the GMT and Oyster Perpetual ranges, with noticeably more significant demand for Pepsis in light of a clear lack of supply and a rumoured discontinuation on the horizon.

It’s been a good start for Patek Philippe transactions too. We’ve handled many sales of Nautilus, Aquanaut and non-sports references recently and there’s noticeable demand for the most value for money references such as the 5164A, 5205G and 5712/1A.

That kind of sums up the Patek Philippe market right now; there’s plenty of sellers and a plethora of buyers out there, but pricing must be realistic and only the best examples which are priced sensibly are actually selling.

If you’re reading this wondering what you should consider buying next, I’d say buy what you really want and buy with your heart.

In the mid-value range, the huge increase in sales and general demand of pre-owned Jaeger-LeCoultre, Panerai and Cartier proves that buyers are buying what they’ve really longed for, as opposed to buying something that might increase in value in the next 6 months, which is considerably more fun for us as dealers.

It’s always nicer to sell a watch to someone knowing they’re going to wear and enjoying it rather than just buying it to sell it for a profit in a few months time.

As usual, there have been relatively significant annual price increases across the board, which hasn’t seemed to have had much of a knock on effect with pre-owned prices.

In light of this, newer examples of pre-owned, current production references are now looking like pretty good value and can only fuel sales of pre-owned watches in the long run as the price gap between new and pre-owned increases.

A good example of this has to be a regular Omega Speedmaster Moonwatch which has just had its RRP raised to £6,600, with pre-owned examples readily available at £5,250 in Europe on Chrono24.

In years gone by, the sheer mention of a potential reference discontinuation got everyone very excited and Chrono24 prices started to inflate almost immediately however, that seems to have changed somewhat.

In the last few weeks we’ve come to the end of the production run for the Aquanaut 5164 and the Nautilus 5980, yet neither have jumped up in price whatsoever.

Maybe a clear sign of the times, and more importantly, a sign of a market where both sellers and buyers have had their fingers burnt previously and sensibility is prevailing once again.

Discontinuations are great as they make way for new exciting references, but time and time again people fail to realise just how many of these watches have been produced during their production run, and it doesn’t take that many of a reference to come onto the market in one go to flood a market and send prices crashing down to where they came from.

Hopefully, for the foreseeable, prices of the most commonly traded watches remain stable, allowing for a more accessible market for buyers on a budget and commodity watches showing a gentle and realistic return for long term investors.

Eddie Bloom is founder and owner of Bloombar Watches.

When considering stable, investment watch brands most of us instantly have in mind the big three: Rolex, Patek Philippe and Audemars Piguet.

These three titans of watchmaking have historically made up more than 75% of stock traded by grey market dealers.

And with good reason too: they are far and away the most saleable brands, with the longest waiting lists worldwide. The buyer pool is deep and getting deeper.

Let’s rewind to January 2022, undoubtedly the peak of the pre-owned watch market.

We at Bloombar had just paid one very happy customer a cool £95,000 for his 2019 AP Royal Oak 15202ST “Jumbo” Extra Thin. We felt certain that it was worth at least £110,000 almost immediately.

This had been the norm for the ensuing eighteen months. Prices of newly flipped and pre-owned Patek Philippe Nautiluses and Aquanauts were rising in value by around 5% every month, causing a knock-on effect to its cheaper and more accessible cousin, the AP Royal Oak. There seemed no end in sight.

Many of us surfed this wave of rapidly rising values in the luxury goods market. But they were bought with low-interest loans, fuelled by sky-rocketing crypto values and post-Covid, government-backed loans that no one really expected to repay.

Covid lockdowns, shuttered watch factories and supply issues played a role, of course, but I think there was more to it than that.

I’m not going to pretend I’m a sage of market insight or that I can predict how geo-political events affect the volatility of the luxury goods market. But for us at Bloombar Watches, there was a clear and defining moment the bubble burst: 24th of February 2022, the day that Russia invaded Ukraine.

Since that historical day, one thing after another has contributed to the uncertainty and panic that in turn has seen grey market value of Audemars Piguet watches plummet – in some cases by more than – 50% since early 2022.

AP wasn’t the only brand to have suffered catastrophic declines in demand and values during that period.

If grey market demand for APs really is the ultimate driver, wouldn’t it be brilliant if the powers that be at Audemars Piguet helped by helping us market their watches better?

Prices of sports Patek models and the most traded Rolexes also saw rapid declines.

It seems, however, that despite falling values, demand for these other brands remained incredibly strong compared to Audemars Piguet.

It’s almost if Patek Philippe sneezed and AP caught not just a cold, but long Covid.

Some say that values of Royal Oaks increased in value far too quickly and it was never sustainable.

They may have been designed by Gérald Genta, the same man who designed the Nautilus and Aquanaut, but is that really enough to place them on par with the holy grail of watches?

Although AP produces just 50,000 watches a year, 12,000 fewer than Patek Philippe, they are essentially a one-model brand.

When values fall, therefore, there’s a far greater risk of Royal Oaks flooding onto the grey market than there is a deluge of Nautiluses and Aquanauts. There’s just a lot less of them out there.

Nearly two years on from the start of the war I can count on two hands the number of enquiries we’ve had for a Royal Oak.

In a way I find this surprising since waiting lists are still allegedly very long for the most popular models.

But are they really?

This leads me to wonder: have investors and speculators been too badly burnt to return to the brand, or is this in fact the perfect time to acquire watches from one of the world’s most desirable watch brands?

It’s no secret that a large percentage of watches sold by grey market dealers are purchased from flippers – people who have schmoozed authorised dealers and hoop-jumped their way into getting their name on “the list” for some of the hardest to get watches. (Paradoxically, the premium that certain watches demand on the grey market is precisely what drives huge demand and long waiting lists.)

We understand, however, that a number of our clients are now turning down watches when their name finally reaches the top of the list, as the premiums just aren’t there anymore.

With this in mind, could Audemars Piguet themselves hold the key to increasing grey market demand?

Hear me out.

If long waiting lists are the key to increased demand, and increased demand is the key to healthy grey market values, and vice versa, then surely it’s worth AP intentionally restricting their production for a period of time – taking one for the team – and allowing demand to rebuild whilst suffering a year or two of lower sales.

The long-term gain would, I feel certain, outweigh the short-term pain.

If grey market demand for APs really is the ultimate driver, wouldn’t it be brilliant if the powers that be at Audemars Piguet helped by helping us market their watches better?

At the time of writing, we have just ten APs for sale on our website, a small number compared to the 127 currently for sale on Watchfinder.co.uk.

We would both love nothing more than to sell them all, as quickly as possible, for as much as possible, but we can only put so much of our marketing budget into promoting watches that are somewhat lacking in demand.

This could all change with some input from the brand themselves and a change in mentality.

Someone very senior at IWC once said to me: “We don’t care if someone buys a new IWC or a pre-owned IWC, so long as they’re wearing an IWC.”

IWC’s mentality may not be for everyone, but I believe that in these uncertain times, taking a leaf out of their marketing book might just be the key to the much-needed revival in demand for Audemars Piguets.

Bloombar Watches was created in 2012 with a mission to establish itself as a premium player in the luxury pre-owned watch market.

Founder Eddie Bloom, who began his career in London’s multimillion pound property market, says that the wealthy clients he worked with then helped him to understand how to deliver a the correct level of service in the watch world.

Within a decade, the business was selling watches worth upwards of £15 million per year thanks, according to Mr Bloom, to the business’s professionalism, discretion and attention to detail.

Bloombar will be taking part within a new Pre-Owned Lounge at November’s WatchPro Salon.

The luxury watch show takes place from November 10-11 at The Londoner Hotel on Trafalgar Square.

Bloombar has a retail presence in London’s Marylebone, but also deals online and privately with a network of collector clients.

The company has in-house sales and purchasing advisors, as well as expert photographers and logistics managers who ensure that every watch and every transaction is handled with the highest level of service.

“Having unrivalled expertise on modern and neo-vintage watches, as well as market trends and investment advice, Bloombar is the ideal partner for any collector,” Mr Bloom says.

Bloombar Watches is appearing among a line up of 50 prestigious brands and a carefully curated lounge of pre-owned businesses exhibiting at this year’s WatchPro Salon, which takes place at The Londoner Hotel on Leicester Square from November 10 to 11.

Click here for full details and to book your tickets.

The ever-expanding exhibitor list of watch brands and prestigious certified pre-owned traders includes:

ARCANAUT | AWAKE | BALL WATCH | BIANCHET | BLOOMBAR | BROOKLANDS WATCH COMPANY | CYRUS | CZAPEK & CIE. | DUCKWORTH PRESTEX | EBAY | ELLIOT BROWN | GERALD CHARLES | HERBELIN | IKEPOD | ISOTOPE | LUMINOX | MERAUD WATCHES | ORIENT | OUT OF ORDER | PERRELET | QLOCKTWO | ROBOT WATCH | SEIKO | SHERPA | SINN | SQUALE | TEMPUS LORD | THE WATCH REGISTER | THE DEVOY GROUP | THE DIAMOND BOX | VAN BRAUGE | VICTORINOX | WOLF | YEMA WATCHES | ZEITWINKEL | ZODIAC

Patek Philippe bounced back in the year after the major pandemic restrictions eased with UK sales rising 80.2% to £187 million.

The watchmaker’s only internally operated boutique, on London’s Bond Street, saw sales increase by 185% to £69 million as shoppers returned to the capital.

Growth in wholesale was back to the long term trend for both revenue and profit while the boutique still appeared to be somewhat behind trend as international shoppers continue to visit London less, and may be put off shopping for big ticket items by the inability to instantly reclaim VAT.

The financial results are for the 12 months ending January 31, 2022, so it is worth remembering that non-essential retail was closed until April last year — more than two months of the reported financial year — so the performance was still affected by covid restrictions.

Operating profit for Patek Philippe UK hit an all time record of £30 million for the 2021-22 financial year.

The boutique contributed £13.4 million of profit compared to a break even in the prior financial year.

Watch houses such as Rolex, Patek Philippe and Audemars Piguet were left with no choice but to close their factories, stores and authorised retailers for long periods of time, leaving waiting lists so long that they’ve basically been reset, and the hard to get pieces are now only reserved for the best clients who spend the most and who are least likely to flip their new watch for a handsome profit.

Rolex may produce in the region of one million watches a year, but what percentage of these are the most desirable steel sports models such as the Daytona, GMT and Submariner?

We would assume fewer than 100,000 per year.

The majority of the most desirable models are purchased by true enthusiasts who actually want to wear and enjoy their watch, which leaves a very small percentage that are purchased purely to flip for a profit.

With very little supply, and an ever increasing demand from buyers who historically had no interest in watches at all, but are now just jumping on the investment band wagon, we are in a position where everything has a waiting list and nothing is obtainable without paying a significant grey market premium.

It’s not just individuals who are investing.

We’re selling more and more watches to companies offering fractional ownership in a Nautilus, Royal Oak or Daytona.

They are quoting returns to their investors in the region of 3-4% a year and are desperate to get their hands on the very best pieces for investment.

Patek Philippe and Audemars Piguet are now so worried about a watch being flipped that buyers are being warned in store that if they so much as advertise their watch for sale, they will never be sold another watch.

Patek and Rolex dealers are actively posing as potential purchasers to try to find out who the flipper culprits are, and this is causing fewer and fewer buyers to risk flipping for a profit, leading to the most desirable and unobtainable pieces only being resold for enormous prices.

Whilst it’s unfortunately true that many people have suffered financially during the pandemic, there have also been a swathe of individuals who have benefitted greatly.

Many of our clients who would usually have spent somewhere in the region of £20,000+ a year on luxury holidays, £30,000+ on private school fees and even more on day to day living saw their expenses slashed, holidays cancelled and private schools charging 50% of their usual fees for Zoom classes.

With their bank accounts safely in the black, no desire to upgrade their car having nowhere to go and full wages still coming in, where did this fortunate pool of investors choose to place their money? Property? Art? Wine? Vintage Cars? Or…. Watches?

In the UK, a second home or rental investment was the go to for the savvy investor, but inflated stamp duty for the purchase of second homes and the inability to offset mortgage interest against your profits has nearly killed the buy to let market, leaving a number of investors seeking alternative investment pastures for their cash.

Art has been a favoured investment for the rich for hundreds of years, but art doesn’t appeal to everyone.

Investment in art requires a huge amount of expertise and values are heavily affected by current trends and fashions.

Big works of art require big walls and valuable pieces are very expensive to insure.

To a new generation of impulsive investors, art might just seem like too much hard work.

Like watches, wine has performed very well over the past year or so, but is it an alternative investment that you can truly enjoy?

Only if you open it, which is not a great move for its investment potential.

Whilst wine investment has a vast worldwide following, it’s also plagued with forgeries, expensive storage costs and risk of being corked.

Some may say that wine investment is a little too sophisticated for your average investor and like art, requires a lot of expertise to get it right.

Vintage cars can be wonderful things to own, and are generally bought by the same type of clientele who buy watches.

That said, they come with huge costs such as storage, insurance and maintenance.

Couple that with limited opportunities to drive them and it makes cars a tricky investment to truly enjoy all year round.

This smoothly brings us onto the topic of enjoyment.

In a time where most of us can genuinely say we have enjoyed very little over the last year or so, what can we buy with our hard earnt money that will bring a smile to our faces, even when working from home?

We’re not for one second implying that material things are the route to happiness, but we watch dealers appreciate the love and passion that can come with watch ownership and the smile that can be generated by glancing down to see your new acquisition on your wrist.

How many alternative assets can you buy that will almost certainly go up in value every single year, are small enough to come with you anywhere in the world no matter what you’re doing, cost next to nothing to insure and maintain and are so hard to get hold of, that just money alone can’t buy them? I certainly can’t think of another one.

Furthermore, an investment is only an investment if it can be sold, and what makes certain investments better than others, is how easy they are to sell.

I have been both fortunate and unfortunate enough to have owned and sold a number of blue chip vintage cars, but let’s be clear about one thing. If you need to sell a vintage car, quickly, the vultures appear, and before you know it, you’ve given away your prized possession for a fraction of what you thought it was worth.

With modern watches from the big three investment brands, a watch is a watch.

It’s not left hand drive or right hand drive. It’s not more popular in certain countries than others. It can be sold anywhere in the world, for almost a fixed market price, very similar to gold bullion, and the market is HUGE.

Watches can be purchased by anyone, from any background, with little or lots of knowledge about them.

They are the status symbol of status symbols, and demand is now so high, that even a Rolex Oyster Perpetual has a waiting list.

Manage to get hold of one in the right colour, and you can see your investment rise by up to 125% on the day you get your hands on it.

I walked down Regent Street and Bond Street last weekend and peered into the windows of four Rolex retailers on my travels, none of whom had one stainless steel watch in any of their windows.

Some say there’s a crash coming and prices can’t keep rising. We beg to differ. The watch is the king of the alternative investment, and it’s here to stay.