CaratTurkey +6.9%, America −14.8%: where Swiss watches went
Swiss watch exports to Turkey rose 6.9% to 165.2 million francs in the first half. Shipments to the United States fell 14.8%, Germany 10.5% and China 5.0%. India rose 31.5% and Mexico 14.9%.
§1The half's best market is the seventeenth.
The best-performing sizeable market for Swiss watches in the first half of 2026 was not in Europe, America or East Asia. Exports to Turkey rose 6.9% to 165.2 million francs, from 154.5 million in the same period of 2025 and 145.2 million in 2024, on Federation of the Swiss Watch Industry figures carried this week by the Turkish press. Turkey remains the industry's seventeenth largest market. Worldwide exports for the half came to 12.8 billion francs, down 0.7%, a total this paper filed on 21 July when the federation published it.
The federation's country table is where the half is decided. The United States, the industry's largest market, fell 14.8%, though it remains 2.6% ahead across two years. Germany fell 10.5%, China 5.0% and Japan 1.6%. Against that, India rose 31.5%, Mexico 14.9%, South Korea 6.5%, the United Kingdom 5.8%, Hong Kong 3.3%, Singapore 2.2% and the United Arab Emirates 1.6%. France rose 63.4%, which the federation attributes to a logistics reclassification rather than to French wrists. The growth in this half sits outside the markets Switzerland built its book on.
§2A country table that points away from the core.
The material table says the same thing about product. Watches in precious metals fell 6.5% and steel watches fell 6.5%, while bimetallic models rose 20.0% and other metals rose 14.4%. Mechanical watches priced under 500 francs at export rose 23.8%, and the 500 to 3,000 franc band, the traditional home of the aspirational Swiss watch, fell 5.7%. Volume across the half rose even as value did not: seven million wristwatches shipped, up 2.3%, on a wristwatch value of 12.2 billion francs, down 0.6%. Switzerland sold more watches for slightly less money, in cheaper materials, to newer places.
The growth in this half sits outside the markets Switzerland built its book on
§3Growth on a small base, decline on a large one.
The proportions want stating plainly, because a growth percentage on a small base does not replace a decline on a large one. Turkey's 165.2 million francs is about 1.3% of the half's total, a share derived by this desk from the published figures rather than published by the federation. India at 31.5% is the more consequential of the two gains and has been the trade's quiet story all year. The American fall is measured against the largest single line in the table, and whether the newer markets can absorb it is a question the second half will answer. Nothing in the first-half table answers it.
A 1.3% market growing is not a substitute for a 14.8% market falling, and the trade should resist reading Turkey as a turn. What the table does say usefully is where the marginal watch is going: to markets with young populations, currencies that make a Swiss watch a store of value, and no established grey-market depth. Turkey and India both fit that description and both grew. For a brand or a retailer planning allocation, though, the actionable line is the material split rather than the geography. Bimetallic up 20.0% against precious metals down 6.5% is a customer buying the look at a lower metal cost, and that is the same substitution this paper has recorded at Chinese and Indian jewellery counters all year.
The trade, filed to your inbox before the New York open.
Prices, tenders and the one story that moved the industry overnight — read in ninety seconds.
Subscribe free →