No live watch auction had ever crossed the hundred-million-dollar line until this weekend. Phillips, working with Bacs & Russo, closed its two-day Geneva Watch Auction: XXIV on 7 and 8 November with a total of CHF 92,045,568, about US$112.3 million, the highest total ever recorded for a live watch sale and comfortably ahead of the record Phillips itself had set only six months earlier.

Every one of the 217 lots found a buyer, a clean sweep by lot and by value, with 2,121 registered bidders from 69 countries competing in the room, online and by telephone. Twenty-four world records fell across the two sessions, and 17 lots passed CHF 1 million. The average price per lot worked out above US$500,000.

F.P. Journe supplied the sale's engine: thirteen of the independent maker's watches together brought CHF 31.8 million. The top lot was a platinum Chronometre a Resonance Regence with a hand-engraved pink gold dial, which sold for CHF 8,680,500. A diamond-set Vagabondage III made CHF 5,057,000, and a pre-production Chronometre a Resonance reached CHF 4,936,000.

Patek Philippe's 1945 steel reference 1436 split-seconds chronograph, one of only two known examples retaining its original steel case and dial, sold for CHF 6,267,000, a record for any split-seconds chronograph. Cartier's 1924 Portico Mystery Clock No. 4, unseen at auction since 1996, fetched CHF 4,815,000, a record for any Cartier timepiece. A newly surfaced yellow gold Rolex reference 6062 Stelline made CHF 2,334,500, while the first part of the Pucci Papaleo Rolex collection totalled CHF 3,784,600.

Phillips framed the result as a celebration of the market's strength. Senior consultant Aurel Bacs, who has led the house's watch department through its rise, said the result reflected the trust of consignors and buyers. The sale's breadth, from Philippe Dufour's platinum Simplicity at CHF 1,968,500 to a first-time record for Voutilainen's tantalum Vingt-8 Inverse, suggested demand reaching well beyond the headline names.