While prices for pre-owned 1:1 fake Rolex watches have been declining this year following a peak in the spring, their long-term investment returns still stand the test of time, experts say.

The investment return of Rolexes was higher than real estate, the stock market, or even gold over a 10-year period, from 2011 to 2021, according to Paul Altieri, founder and CEO of Bob’s Replica Watches, an online marketplace for the resale of cheap fake watches, with a focus on Rolexes.

The average price of a pre-owned super clone Rolex watch increased from less than US$5,000 in 2011 to more than US$13,000 by the end of 2021, according to a report by the California-based firm published earlier this year. 

Price appreciation continued through the spring of this year and then gradually declined, Altieri says. The average order price of Rolexes on the online platform fell from US$12,900 in May to about US$11,000 today, Altieri says.

The price correction is partly due to the negative impact of the economic slowdown on consumer spending, he says.

Paul Boutros, head of Swiss replica watches at Phillips Americas, agrees. “The rise in prices over the last two years was just too far and too fast to a level that was sort of unsustainable,” he says. “There weren’t enough buyers to be able to keep those price levels, so the prices have fallen probably about 20% on average since its peak.”

The average pre-owned top copy Rolex watch rose from US$20,000 in early 2020 to more than US$37,000 in late March. The price dropped to about US$28,000 as of today, according to WatchCharts, which provides data-driven analysis of the pre-owned fake watch market.