Announced at the end of April at the Joker XXX auction, auction house Ineichen Zurich has permanently removed sales commissions on the purchase of watches at their auctions. But what does this mean?
The market is changing and at Ineichen they are smart
In a conversation with their young CEO, Artemy Lechbinsky, he told us how the market was about to change. It was just before the Geneva auction season, which would show the market trend for this year.
According to Artemy, everything would have changed (and in fact it is changing), passing from a seller’s market, where the seller has the power and decides on the price, to a buyer’s market, where the power is held by those who buy (enthusiasts, collectors, etc.) .
This happens for two main reasons: an excessive supply at dizzying prices (market increased by 100% in a few months), which do not reflect the true value of watches, and an ever lower demand for such figures. You don’t need a degree in Economics to understand that when there are no buyers at certain figures, the market drops accordingly.
How do you buy a watch at auction?
In un vecchio articolo citavamo tutte le modalità di partecipazione alle aste in presenza e online, con una sezione esclusivamente dedicata al buyer’s premium. Acquistare un orologio in asta non è un gioco da ragazzi, soprattutto nelle grandi realtà. Bisogna tenere conto di commissioni d’acquisto, tasse di importazione, esportazione e tutta un’altra serie di fattori strettamente legati all’orologio.
In case you want to review the methods, you can read the article here.
The famous Buyer’s Premium, the purchase commissions
The famous buyer’s premium is what has always confused me personally at the level of calculations during auctions, not so much for the difficulty in adding 20-30% on the beaten price, but more for the lack of immediacy and confusion for a customer.
If you are not sure what it is, I’ll explain it to you in a few words. When you buy a watch at auction, you pay the amount sold in the room or online + a commission that varies from 30% to 20%, which decreases according to how high the price is (higher amount, lower commissions). All this goes in stages and is known in the Conditions of Sale section of each auction house.
The number of foreign buyers buying in Switzerland is increasing, which leads, in most cases, to the need to do a currency exchange calculation to find out what amount you are bidding on. If you are an expert bidder you will already be used to all this, but the lack of immediacy is undeniable.
The case of Ineichen and the Royal 50 auction on the anniversary of the Royal Oak
Those listed so far are some of the reasons that brought Ineichen to the decision of permanently removing the buyer’s premium, which in our opinion will attract new customers both from abroad and from Italy itself. The auction house will only agree with the seller for a percentage of commissions, to be paid by the latter.
The first full sale not to have buyer’s premium will be the Royal 50 thematic auction on the anniversary of Gerald Genta’s Royal Oak. Within the catalog there will be 50 lots of historic and extremely rare pieces, from classic 5402s to ultra-complicated watches such as the Grande Sonnerie or the 25th Anniversary Skeletonized Tourbillon.
What do you think of this choice by the Zurich auction house?
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