Fake Rolexes Make Up 50% of the Counterfeit Luxury Watch Market, Exec Says
The counterfeit watch market is growing—and it appears to favor a certain renowned Swiss brand.
Watchfinder & Co. chief executive CEO Arjen van de Vall told Bloomberg that up to 10 percent of the timepieces the luxury pre-owned watch company received from sellers last year were fakes, with Rolexes being the most frequent knockoffs.
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“Rolex is the most aspirational luxury watch brand and the highest demand, hence, it’s the most replicated,” van de Vall said.
Watchfinder, which is owned by Swiss luxury corporation Richemont, was once able to spot 80 percent of fake watches on sight. However, van de Vall says that now only 20 percent can be visually identified as fakes because they have become increasingly more convincing. The company’s employees now have to perform a more thorough authentication process, including inspecting watch casebacks and checking movements to spot the counterfeit watches.
Of course, Rolexes aren’t the only luxury watches being imitated. “You see replica or clone watches—very, very high quality watches—of virtually all of the big luxury brands,” van de Vall said. They run “the whole gamut.”
Replica luxury watches are a real problem in the €25 billion ($27.3 billion) per year secondary watch market, which is already suffering. During the pandemic, the industry saw an unprecedented boom. However, the grey market has declined in the last year as wealthy buyers splurge less amid global economic fluctuations. In fact, the market has contracted 19 percent in the past year, according to the Bloomberg Subdial Watch Index, which follows prices for the 50 most traded luxury watch models by value such as Rolex, Patek Philippe and Audemars Piguet.
Last year, Rolex launched certified pre-owned program that authenticates used watches sold through authorized dealers. Buyers of pre-owned timepieces certified by the brand receive certificates of authenticity, a two-year warranty card, and a “wax seal” tag. Whether the Crown’s CPO will ultimately serve to curtail the counterfeit market is an open question.
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