Unlikely winners in latest Swiss watch export data

The October Swiss watch export figures show that watches priced between CHF 500 and CHF 3,000 reported the strongest growth.

A price category that has proved problematic for a while now, the surprise year-on-year gains were in both volume (+9.6%) and value (+9.4%).

With the USA still correcting from the surge in exports (pre-39% tariff introduction) in July and being almost 50% down year on year, the UAE at least provided a silver lining, reporting export value growth of 39.81%.

Other winners included China (+12.60%) and France (+10.73%).

Looking at the year to date (January – October) shows only a mild decline (-1.6%), but this may be at least in part due to the significant rise in exports to the States in July.

The biggest loser, in terms of price segment, was the usually robust category of watches over CHF 3,000, which showed year on year negative growth of -14.9% (units) and -7.1% (value).