Five sale listings across four houses frame Geneva’s early-November watch calendar; live sales start on 7 November and Sotheby’s online Fine Watches closes on 10 November. Calendar sources
Phillips’ steel Patek Philippe 1436 carries a CHF 2–4M estimate (about US$2.43–4.85M); the same watch previously achieved CHF 3.301M in 2015. Current lot, previous sale
Christie’s announces 39 independent watches among 218 timepieces, or 17.9% of its sale; four Phillips highlights below have open-ended estimates and cannot be ranked by a published ceiling. Christie’s announcement, Phillips catalogue
The sale calendar
| House | Official sale | Dates in 2026 | Published count / coverage |
|---|---|---|---|
| Antiquorum | Important Modern & Vintage Timepieces | 7–8 November | 603 listed lots |
| Phillips | The Geneva Watch Auction: XXIV | 7–8 November | 218 listed lots |
| Sotheby's | Important Watches | Live start: 8 November, 10:00 CET; end date unresolved | 184 listed results |
| Christie's | Rare Watches Including Watches for ELA | 9 November | 218 announced timepieces |
| Sotheby's | Fine Watches | 27 October–10 November (online) | Catalogue count unavailable |
Sotheby’s department index lists Important Watches on 8–9 November, while the sale-specific page confirms an 8 November live start. The 20 October date on that page is the opening of advance bidding. The final session schedule needs reconfirmation. Department calendar
The counts have different scopes and are not added together: Antiquorum and Phillips include other forms of timekeeping. Phillips’ current catalogue shows 218 lots, superseding the September announcement of at least 220. Sotheby’s Fine Watches page showed no populated lot results when inspected; that does not establish a final sale of zero lots. Watches for ELA is part of Christie’s sale, rather than another auction. Antiquorum, Phillips catalogue, ELA
Fifteen highlights and the documented benchmark
The first eleven entries are ordered by published high estimate; the last four have no published upper bound. This is a partial editorial selection from accessible catalogue and official press material, not an exhaustive cross-house ranking. Antiquorum and Sotheby’s lot coverage remains incomplete. Each dollar estimate uses one research exchange rate; it is not the house’s own dollar quote.
| House / lot | Watch / manufacture year | Estimate: original / converted USD | Record to beat in our ledger, after source review |
|---|---|---|---|
| Phillips 95 | Patek Philippe 1436 Split-seconds chronograph (1945) | CHF 2.00M–4.00M / US$ 2.43M–4.85M | CHF 3,301,000; Phillips Geneva, 2015-11-07. Same watch, previous sale. |
| Phillips 20 | Rolex 6241 Cosmograph Daytona John Player Special (Circa 1969) | CHF 800k–1.60M / US$ 970k–1.94M | no documented comparison¹ |
| Christie's, lot no. pending² | F.P. Journe T Tourbillon Souverain, silvered dial (2001) | CHF 650k–1.40M / US$ 788k–1.70M | no documented comparison¹ |
| Christie's, lot no. pending² | F.P. Journe Chronomètre à Résonance Ruthenium (year not stated) | CHF 650k–1.20M / US$ 788k–1.46M | US$13,922,000; Phillips New York, 2026-06-13/2026-06-14. Family comparison; different variant. |
| Christie's, lot no. pending² | F.P. Journe Tourbillon Souverain Ruthenium (year not stated) | CHF 650k–1.20M / US$ 788k–1.46M | CHF 7,320,000; Phillips Geneva, 2024-11-08. Family comparison; different variant. |
| Christie's, lot no. pending² | Patek Philippe 1518 Perpetual-calendar chronograph (1948) | CHF 500k–1.00M / US$ 606k–1.21M | CHF 14,190,000 / US$17,631,075; Phillips Geneva, 2025-11-08/2025-11-09. Steel, not yellow gold. |
| Christie's, lot no. pending² | Patek Philippe 3700/1 Nautilus Khanjar (1978) | CHF 500k–1.00M / US$ 606k–1.21M | US$6,503,500; Phillips New York, 2021-12. Family comparison; different variant. |
| Phillips 125 | F.P. Journe Chronomètre à Résonance Pre-Production 022/99 (1999) | CHF 500k–1.00M / US$ 606k–1.21M | US$13,922,000; Phillips New York, 2026-06-13/2026-06-14. Family comparison; different variant. |
| Phillips 128 | Patek Philippe 530 Calatrava (1941) | CHF 400k–800k / US$ 485k–970k | no documented comparison¹ |
| Phillips 161 | F.P. Journe Chronomètre à Résonance Tokyo Boutique (2007) | CHF 400k–800k / US$ 485k–970k | US$13,922,000; Phillips New York, 2026-06-13/2026-06-14. Family comparison; different variant. |
| Phillips 195 | Patek Philippe 1436 Split-seconds chronograph Tiffany & Co. (1959) | CHF 400k–800k / US$ 485k–970k | CHF 3,301,000; Phillips Geneva, 2015-11-07. Steel, not Tiffany gold. |
| Phillips 131 | Rolex 6264 Cosmograph Daytona Paul Newman Lemon (Circa 1970) | >CHF 1.00M / >US$ 1.21M | no documented comparison¹ |
| Phillips 208 | Rolex 3830 Anti-Magnetique Verga (Circa 1941) | >CHF 1.00M / >US$ 1.21M | no documented comparison¹ |
| Phillips 7 | F.P. Journe Chronomètre à Résonance Régence (2002) | >CHF 1.00M / >US$ 1.21M | US$13,922,000; Phillips New York, 2026-06-13/2026-06-14. Family comparison; different variant. |
| Phillips 129 | Rolex 6062 Stelline triple-calendar moonphase (Circa 1952) | >CHF 600k / >US$ 728k | CHF 5,066,000; Phillips Geneva, 2017-05. Bao Dai; different dial/provenance. |
¹ “no documented comparison” means that no result for this reference passed our source check for this note. We hold candidate results, but we do not publish them as records until the primary source confirms them. The time-only Patek 530 is not compared with a chronograph bearing the same reference number.
² Christie’s press release gives these watches and their estimates but not their lot numbers, so these rows link to the announcement. We will add the lot numbers once we have checked them in the catalogue.
The four open-ended estimates supersede the numerical ranges carried in Phillips’ September press release or page data. The Cartier Portico No. 4, lot 220, is a clock rather than a wristwatch; its CHF 1.8–3.2M estimate therefore sits outside this selection. Clock catalogue
What to watch
- A repeat sale with an identifiable earlier result. The 1945 steel 1436 has movement 863056 and case 630772 in both catalogues. Its CHF 2–4M estimate brackets the previous CHF 3.301M result. The earlier result includes premium, while the estimate excludes it, so the figures serve different purposes. 2026 catalogue, 2015 catalogue
- Read the Journe variants before comparing prices. The US$13.922M Souscription Résonance result is a family benchmark, not a record for a Tokyo, Régence or Ruthenium edition. Christie’s says the five formerly Schumacher-owned Ruthenium watches will be sold separately; a price for a five-watch set is not a single-watch comparison. Phillips result, Christie’s announcement
- Keep metal, dial and sale purpose attached to the benchmark. The documented 1518 benchmark is steel, while Christie’s offered example is yellow gold. The Nautilus family benchmark is a Tiffany-blue 5711 sold for charity, not an Omani Khanjar 3700/1. Neither is a matched valuation of the offered watch. 1518 result, Nautilus history
- Separate catalogue composition from market direction. Christie’s 39 independent watches represent 17.9% of its 218 announced timepieces, a useful measure of that sale’s composition. Our ledger’s uneven annual coverage and source defects do not support a 2026-versus-2025 market-growth claim. House announcement, our methodology
Methodology and sources
Research cutoff: 22 October 2026. Sale names, dates, counts and estimates come from the linked house catalogues or official announcements. Catalogue observations and press counts are labelled separately. No house-published aggregate low/high estimate was verified, and none is manufactured by summing incomplete or open-ended estimates. Calendar discovery also checked Bonhams, Ineichen, Piguet and charity organisers; no further standalone watch auction in the window was confirmed. That is not proof of exhaustive coverage.
USD estimates use the Swiss National Bank’s 21 October 2026 rate: US$1 = CHF 0.8245; USD = CHF ÷ 0.8245. Displayed USD values are rounded to three significant figures; the research data retains dollar-rounded calculations. Historical results retain their original reported currency or contemporaneous USD figure; today’s FX is not applied to them. Estimates exclude buyer’s premium and taxes; documented results generally include premium. SNB rate, Phillips buying guide
Our 22 October snapshot contains 1,187 ledger entries: 1,021 generated historical records, 98 curated entries and 68 auction-desk entries read from Firestore. These are corpus-coverage counts, not a census of watch auctions. We searched the same full reference first, then an explicitly defined model family when no exact match existed. A reference match does not establish the same metal, dial, condition or provenance. Source review found incorrect lot URLs and currency ambiguity in some ledger entries; those entries were corrected or left out of this note, and we are fixing them in the ledger. Dealer listings were inspected as asking prices, not transactions; no current reference median is quoted without an in-stock match.
Public-site collection used the existing robots guard, an identified research user-agent and low request rates. Collection stopped where website terms prohibited automated extraction. Incomplete catalogue fields remain visible rather than being guessed.
Explore documented records, Patek Philippe, Rolex, F.P. Journe, the Résonance family, the Nautilus family, the auction calendar and methodology.
How to cite
MostExpensiveWatches, “Geneva watch auctions, November 2026: a steel Patek 1436 returns,” 22 October 2026, https://mostexpensivewatches.net/blog/geneva-watch-auctions-november-2026-preview. When you quote an individual estimate or result, please cite the linked auction-house source as well.