Richemont opens new fiscal year with growth across every region
The Swiss luxury group's jewellery houses led a broad-based sales recovery as watches also returned to growth.
Richemont has opened its 2027 fiscal year with sales growth across all regions, according to Luxury Daily, giving the owner of Cartier and Van Cleef & Arpels a strong start after a period of uneven demand across the luxury sector. The group's jewellery maisons were the standout performer, with sales climbing 24%, underlining how bridal and high jewellery categories have proved far more resilient through the downturn than leather goods or fashion. Richemont's specialist watchmaking division also improved, with revenue up sequentially, a notable turn after watches had been the weakest part of the portfolio for several quarters as retailers worked through excess stock.
The result matters beyond Richemont's own numbers. Jewellery has emerged as the most dependable growth engine in hard luxury, benefiting from its higher share of self-purchase and gifting occasions and its relative insulation from the logo fatigue that has hit some fashion houses. Watches returning to sequential growth, even modestly, will be read across the Swiss industry as a sign that the destocking cycle triggered by weak Chinese and Asian wholesale demand may be nearing its end.
For Richemont, the results also serve as a rebuttal to investors who have questioned whether its jewellery houses can keep outgrowing peers as compares get tougher. The broad-based regional growth suggests demand has not simply rotated between markets but genuinely improved, a distinction that matters given how currency and geopolitical volatility have distorted regional comparisons across the sector this year. What to watch is whether the momentum in jewellery can be sustained into the autumn selling season, and whether the watch recovery extends to third-party retailers who have been the most cautious buyers in the chain.
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