The watch export data is in and it’s down, way down. The latest numbers and charts provided by the Federation of the Swiss Watch Industry came in the deepest and darkest shade of red to date. Following the Covid19 global pandemic and global lockdown measures, the exports tanked to a painful 81.3%.
Everything is down, and nobody is surprised. With global consumer markets shutting the door, this should indeed not surprise anyone but the most uninformed citizens of the globe.
The interesting bit is however that the drop in China exports has somewhat gotten less dramatic. Being the first country to enter the lockdown they are also the first to exit and as a result markets have picked up a little bit again. They are nowhere near the pre-pandemic levels of course, but we have to appreciate any and all good news in these cirumstances.
These dramatic statistics are not related to the terrible watch releases or terrible management of the watch industry. This is an extraordinary event, in principle anyone in the industry with enough reserves (or financial backers willing to stick their necks out) will ride this out.
The long term effects of this dramatic crash in exports remains to be seen.
wow, that’s some serious cliff diving!
To be expected! Any view on the Japanese data?