Interesting things are happening at Rolex, the world's best-selling luxury watch brand that first comes to mind when it comes to luxury watches. Exactly 116 years after its foundation, Rolex will start selling second-hand Rolexes at its authorized dealers for the first time. Second-hand Rolexes, which are expertly inspected by watchmakers authorized by Rolex, will be offered for sale with an authorized dealer certificate

Interesting things have been happening at Rolex, especially in the last 10-15 years. Until 10-15 years ago, you could go to a Rolex dealer and easily buy any Rolex you wanted, except for the limited edition full steel Daytona model. If the model you were looking for was not available at the dealer at that time, it was either obtained from another dealer or your name was put on a waiting list and specially ordered from the factory, but within 1-2 months at most, you would have the model you wanted, at the dealer's sales price, and sometimes even with small discounts as a result of bargaining.

Unfortunately, this situation has changed slowly over the last 10-15 years. As more people in the world reach certain fortunes, there has been an incredible explosion of demand for the most well-known watch brand, Rolex. As a result of this demand, which far exceeded the annual production of the factory, dealers began to run out of models. Especially after the pandemic, Rolex watches are no longer available at authorized dealers.

Today, when you go to a Rolex authorized dealer, it is possible to find only the simplest, most basic and cheapest models. There are 2-3 year waiting lists for models such as Submariner, Gmt Master II, Daytona, Sea Dweller, Sky Dweller, Deep Sea, Day Date etc.

After the pandemic, the nicknames given to Rolex watches based on their models and colors with a successful marketing strategy have further increased the demand for these watches. There are those inspired by drinks and nicknames such as Pepsi, Sprite, Coke; there are watches inspired by movies and named as Hulk, Batman, Batgirl, Bruce Wayne, Kermit; there are also watches that got those nicknames when celebrities wore those watches and were called John Mayer, James Cameron, Paul Newman.

Due to this increasing demand, a huge gray market has emerged in the watch sector and these watches have started to be sold in this gray market at 100-150% higher than authorized dealer prices. For example, while a Pepsi has a list price of around $11,000 at an authorized dealer, since it is impossible to buy the watch from an authorized dealer, it has started to be sold for $20,000-25,000 in the gray market. Even a second-hand one has exceeded the price of a new one at an authorized dealer at $15,000.

It is not known whether it is because of the advantages brought by its features such as being accepted all over the world, being instantly convertible to cash and being easily carried anywhere in the world when worn on the wrist, or because of the demand brought by the increase in wealth in certain groups, but we can easily say that today Rolex watches have proven themselves to be very good investments many times over. A Rolex that you bought 5-10 years ago can easily be sold for twice as much in terms of dollars today. With this premium potential, it is obvious that it has performed well above the BIST, which still has not surpassed its value from 24 years ago.

Moreover, since Rolex belongs to a foundation, it does not consider turnover and profit maximization and is definitely not willing to increase its production due to increasing demand. Prestige is more important than profit for the brand. After all this, we can say that Rolex is a very good investment for those who can afford it among watch lovers and will continue to be so.

The information, comments and recommendations contained herein are not within the scope of investment consultancy. Investment consultancy services are provided within the framework of the investment consultancy agreement to be signed between brokerage firms, portfolio management companies, banks that do not accept deposits and customers. The comments in this article are only my personal comments and these comments may not be appropriate for your financial situation and risk return. For this reason, investments should not be made based on the information and comments in my articles.