Just wanted to see what everyone thought of Philipp Stahl's latest article? He seems to be the vintage Rolex guru and this is what he said in his latest post:

What will be the hot Rolex for 2020?

In general I believe that we will see a continues growth of exceptional quality for any kind of Rolex reference. Not much will change in 2020 what didn’t already start in 2019. Collectors want the best and rarest pieces in their collection. 2019 was a more conservative year, a lot of owners decided to wait and see how the market would react on the rumored crisis. We saw price correction in the middle segment specially for those pieces that went up significantly in the past years like Big Red Daytona’s. There where any Paul Newman Daytona sold high in the last years we now see that only perfect Paul Newman’s achieve a premium. The market has become much more mature and collector know exactly what they want and only buy when it meets their expectations. Iconic references are always sought after.

In 2019 not the same quality has been offered for sale during auctions compared to earlier years. Beter quality deserves a higher price. For example the Lemon 6264 Daytona sold below $1million recently at Phillips but at the same time a really great one sold for more then $1million privately. The buyers are there but couldn’t find best at sales. Same story about offered RCO, it was not perfect. Collectors do want to pay million+ for perfect but problem is these Rolex are very rare and didn’t came up at auction.

I think 2019 was a very important and good year although the talks about crisis etc. In 2020 we will see more important Rolex coming for sale because collectors noticed that the sky didn’t fall and results are still great for honest condition. Besides that the second hand and vintage market is exploding by all attention we get worldwide. The future looks bright for exceptional Rolex that’s for sure…

My gut feeling tells me that the following vintage Rolex models will perform higher in 2020:

• Pump Pusher Daytonas.
• Perpetual Daytonas.
• Early Oyster Chronographs.
• All GMT Masters.
• Important Submariners.
• Early Explorer.
• Rare diamond Rolex.

Pump Pusher Daytonas.



Important Submariners and perfect tropical dials.



Early Oyster Chronographs.



All GMT Masters.



Early Explorer.



Gold Daytona & Submariners.



Most logically Rolex will finally introduce an updated and vintage inspired new Milgauss & Explorer 2 at Basel world, which will have a positive effect of the prices of Ref 1019’s and Ref 1655’s…



This post was written by Philipp on January 9, 2020.

 

It's a Frankenwatch

 

The same pic is released at this time every year. I can’t see it. Would make it a white dial with black ceramic bezel and possibly take away from the mystique of the Daytona - but who knows....

 

Reads like a stock market analysis, any "passion" here is about money.

Revolting.

 

It always baffles me that somebody passionate about fine watches has to be a fool with money... Basically if you have an interest in watches you have to belong to a non profit organisation. Oh, I get the connection now

 

<cough>

 

oh me and good ole Phil have gone at it a few times over his self-serving self-aggrandizing "passion reports".

 

Should be the shit shoveling report.

 

I’m entirely put off by all the price talk regarding vintage watches, and especially Rolex. I actually love the look of vintage Rolex, and was lucky to acquire a beautiful 1675 this year, but I’m moving in an entirely different direction in the future.

 

I have seen this pic for a few years as well but it’s getting more and more likely they will change up the Expl II soon. As to what exactly they will do, it’s speculation.

 

People have been predicting what Rolex would do for as long as I can remember and the predictions never come true. Rolex is gonna do what Rolex is gonna do. Resistance is futile, go with the flow.

 

if you go read the threads on TRF. . .love Stahl or hate him but he NAILED exactly what Rolex would do last year. to the point where it appeared he had an inside source

 

Let me know if you want to sell that 1675

 

i think he's dead right about early explorers and pump pusher daytonas

and man i'm dying for that modern millgauss. . .

 

and that's fine if it was the core focus of this hobby. unfortunately I get the impression from most of these so-called "watch gurus" that it's all about the money and they would just as easily passionately extoll the virtues of invictas if the numbers were similar.

 

um. the quote was

Evitzee said: ↑
People have been predicting what Rolex would do for as long as I can remember and the predictions never come true. Rolex is gonna do what Rolex is gonna do. Resistance is futile, go with the flow.

this is factually wrong. he nailed his predictions last year with what rolex would come out with and he probably has a source inside rolex.

as to whether the money ruins the watches and his predictions about values . . the values these watches trade at are just an observable fact. yes it would be nice and quaint if they traded at a price that everyone could afford like the good old days, but that is not the case.

do you really expect people spending 50 or 100k or 1mm on a vintage watch to not care about future values ?? that's not how the world works. there are plenty of corners of the vintage world where everyone can afford great watches but vintage rolex isn't likely to ever be one of them again

 

Stahl and a few others are not merely reporting and observing. they are boosting the value of their own inventory via these "passion GTGs" and reports. these guys are not observers or reporters, they are very busy dealers. regardless of what some vintage Rolexes might be trading for, i'm not going to drink their koolaid. I have seen Stahl denigrate one guy's old beat up explorer only to promote one of his beat to shit examples as an "honest survivor". it's all a matter of whose inventory or watch is being "reported" on.

 

my rough guess is $100 million of vintage rolex traded at auction last year. far more privately behind the scenes. you think Stahl or dealers control the market ? no one does. . its the market. look at what happened to Heuer post the Phillips sale debacle

manual wind daytonas are down 20% off the peaks. . .it doesn't matter what Stahl or anyone else says. the market is the market and the verdict of the market is inevitable and bloodless

that said.. . you can drink whatever kool aid you want and spike it with whatever is in your cabinet. the fact is these watches trade for really big dough and that is not likely to change anytime soon. and there is no hobby in collectibles where people plunk down 100k for something and don't worry about future values in some form or fashion.

 

oh i'm not debating this or the values of these watches at all. i'm commenting on the notion that Stahl is some sort of "passionate" vintage rolex guru. James Dowling yes. Eric Ku yes. Stahl no.

 

ahh. agreed entirely. we should start a separate thread on his "prototypes"