Luxury Watch Market Takes Battering
The third largest luxury goods merchant in the world Ricemont has provided a financial statement which discussed the fact that their profits are down this financial year when compared to the previous year.
The head of the Board gave an interview on Wednesday to a vast number of journalists where he was quoted as saying that the company would earn less than last year but had taken steps including a freeze on hiring as well as cutting the number of positions, so that the company would see out this particular financial crisis and get back to selling wrist jewellery like the Guess watches.
Many onlookers in Europe are hoping for a change in the financial mood by Christmas, however retail merchants especially are bracing themselves for a trying third and fourth quarter, although they will be pleased if they are wrong.
He did not forecast any turnabout in the US luxury watch market just yet and was unwilling to anticipate whether the financial crisis in Europe had actually bottomed out yet; he in fact hinted that the financial crisis was still in full swing, and could have a little bit more to give.
Some have suggested that the demand for the majority of costly watches has has been taking a battering recently, although the Richemont brand isn’t showing the same signs of having been as dramatically effected as badly as some of the brands in the Swiss watch market.
However various other markets were taking up the slack including the Chinese market which Richemont disclosed would be its individual biggest market within three years; quite plausibly overtaking that of Japan.
The company did not contrive to take over or take on any additional companies at the moment as, however Ricemont could well afford some acquisitions primarily due to the liquidity levels in the business of over 820 million at the end of March this year. These CEO also restated that should more funds be needed these could be easily got at via the normal capital markets, and only this particular strategy is not a priority at present.
