The majority of the watch auctions are over and it is time to try and read the ‘tea leaves’ and offer collectors some insight. Many records were broken including $500’ooo for a day date. Those will be the headlines.
But read between the lines and some things happened that were quite surprising.
The newcomer (or maybe we should the returner) in the watch auction business, Phillips, certainly stole the show with their glamorous day-date auction. Aurel Bacs- who remained absent for more than a year, returned to create a special themed sale for the day-date.
It was extremely well received by the market.
The auction will undoubtedly lift the average price for a day-date. Just as with the last themed auction that Bacs staged with the ‘Daytona’, 100% of the lots sold and many records were broken. It was a real pleasure to see ‘the master’ back on the podium. Some collectors I spoke to dismissed the auction as a good show and that there was plenty of ‘hype’ – I saw it differently.
Some outstanding watches were offered, with rare paperwork, the quality was strong and the prices paid simply reflected that. Of course clever marketing helped results. It should be mentioned that the strong results at the day-date sale was also the result of ‘Paddle Nr 1’ also known as CS, paying almost any price for his Middle Eastern clients.
I estimate that Paddle Nr 1 alone bid and won at least 30-35% of the entire day-date sale. This did not please many other collectors in the room. Fast forward a day later and Phillips once again broke several records with their Day One sale. This is not surprising. Aurel Bacs is the best-connected man in the watch business.
He knows the biggest collectors in the world and more importantly he also knows their collecting habits better than anybody else. Together with the fact that he built a world-class team behind him (I dare say also rather attractive – judging by the nice young ladies who were bidding on the telephone), of course the probability was high that Phillips would achieve incredible results.
Phillips expected to do $15m in sales in the best-case scenario with both the day-date sale and the day one sale. They ended up doubling this estimate and did together nearly $30m in sales with relatively little lots.
However not all went perfectly smooth at Phillips.
Collectors are becoming smarter and doing their homework with the aid of various blogs like Hodinkee, RolexPassionReport, PuristSPro and Instagram (believe it or not). So if the quality was just mediocre instead of outstanding, the results reflected that.
A case in point were some of the most collectable Rolex models of all time. The 5513 millsub, the 5513 Explorer dial and the 6200 Submariner– these are the most collectible Rolex watches on the planet – offered by Phillips. Not even the magic of Bacs on the podium helped. They all sold below the market prices and well below the high estimates (the 6200 submariner sold near the low end of the estimate). Why? The quality was not there. Plain and simple.
They were nice watches -but not outstanding watches. When Phillips did have rare and outstanding watches- collectors paid up handsomely. I am thinking of a Vacheron salmon dial chronograph or a rare and untouched Patek Philippe Chronograph ref 1506 in pink gold.
A similar excercise happened at other auction houses. Antiquorum sold an incredible Rolex submariner 5512 in outstanding condition for more than CHF 55’ooo nearly four times the low estimate! Also their beautiful Reverso with exceptional provenance (The General McArthur Reverso-this was one of my personal favorite watches of the entire auction) sold for four times the high estimate (I hope the buyer was the Jaeger Le Coultre museum- it belongs there).
So if the quality was there or if it was just a very rare watch – collectors took notice (if you wondering who snapped up the ultra rare Audemars Piguet minute repeater- it was indeed the Audemars museum).
If the quality was not there- collectors correctly recognized it and did not bid.
NB: The 6062 above (main picture) that was available at Phillips day one auction should provide aspiring collectors hope that bargains do exist-even in the vintage Rolex world. It went unsold despite being a very nice example of Rolex most complicated reference ever made.
There were no offers at CHF 150’ooo, which I assume was the seller’s reserve price. After some further investigation, the ‘Pyramid 6062’ got sold after the auction probably for a price near CHF 150-160’ooo (the estimate was CHF 160-260’ooo).
In the words of one leading expert this represented a ‘moment of auction inefficiency’. A rare and complicated Rolex that was of good quality not selling. One clever buyer closed the deal after the watch went unsold at auction.
