The reports presented last week in Milan by the Altagamma Foundation and consultancy firm Bain & Company confirmed the world luxury market has reached a maturity and stabilisation phase with moderate growth expected this year, around the same level as in 2013.

Healthy growth trend

“We are entering a new phase for the sector, one I would define as a new normal,” said Claudia D’Arpizio, Director of Bain & Company’s Milan Office. “The absence of explosive phenomena in the short term, as China has been in recent years, and at the same time the greater capacity to react to the crisis in the mature markets is resulting in a more stable and healthy growth trend, of between 4% and 6% at constant exchange rates in the next few years", she adds.

The growth rate was +6.5% at constant exchange rates in 2013 (+2% at current exchange rates) and +5% at constant rates in 2012 (+10% at current exchange rates).

Altagamma forecasts a constant growth rate of around 6% for 2014, similar to that of last year.

US and Asia drive growth

As for the geographical markets, the US is once again the engine for growth while Europe is bolstered above all by tourist consumption, even if the consumption of the Russians has fallen on the domestic market and in the main European capital cities.

Chinese consumers are increasingly important on both the domestic and overseas market (from Japan and Korea to Australia, South East Asia, the US and Canada) while the Japanese are finally spending again on the local market.

Japan has demonstrated consistent real growth but with a negative exchange rate effect. Continental China is lacking in dynamism, Hong Kong and Macau are doing fine, South Korea is still not very dynamic, while South East Asia, and Indonesia in particular, is enjoying strong growth.

“We expect a growth rate of +9% in Japan, +8% in the Middle East, +7% in Asia, +6% in the Americas and +4% in Europe, while for the Rest of the World we forecast growth of +7%,” comments Armando Branchini, Vice Chairman of Altagamma.

The luxury market is increasingly guided by “consumer flows and segments of consumers influenced by tourism, by the behaviour of various nationalities, and by fluctuations in exchange rates which alter consumption patterns,” Altagamma concludes.