Image disaster: Swatch shares plummet after launching collaboration with Audemars Piguet

Shares of Swiss watchmaker Swatch Group fell by 2.8% at the opening of trading on Monday, Ma. 18, after the launch of a collaboration with luxury brand Audemars Piguet, which caused a stir around the world. At the time of publication of this text, the fall in Swatch quotations has been reduced to about 1%.

The limited edition collection was named Royal Pop - similar to the exclusive Roal Oak chronographs from Audemars Piguet. At the same time, the start of sales turned into chaos: to buy a watch worth about $400, people stood in multi-day queues, fought, attacked protective structures, in some cases Swatch had to close stores, and the police - to use tear gas, reports The Guardian.

At the same time, many of those who managed to get the Royal Pop, almost immediately put them up for resale. On the largest platform Chrono24 ads appeared, in which the novelty Swatch is offered at a price of up to €5000, writes Bloomberg.

"Judging from the footage captured this weekend and the resulting chaos, the people in the queues seem to have been clearly only interested in immediate resale and not the product itself, which is quite sad," Pierre-Olivier Essig, head of research at AIR Capital, told the agency. - If Swatch was seeking shock excitement, it succeeded!". Essig considers the company's shares attractive for speculative buying.

"The AP x Swatch launch turned out to be an image disaster due to terrible logistics," commented Oliver Müller of LuxeConsult. - I still think it's a good idea and concept. But the execution has to be up to par.

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