Compagnie Financiere Richemont SA reported a 13 percent sales gain to approximately $2.3 billion in the first quarter.

The Geneva-based company’s Jewelry Maisons group (which includes Cartier and Van Cleef & Arpels) rose by 16 percent to approximately $1.2 billion, for the period ended June 30. All regions reported double-digit growth at constant exchange rates, with the exception of Japan where there was a mid-single digit decrease, the company said.

The company’s seven specialist watch brands (which is made up of Jaeger-LeCoultre, Piaget, IWC, Baume & Mercier, Vacheron Constantin, Officine Panerai and A. Lange & Söhne) reported a 13 percent increase to approximately $658.8 million for the period.

The company said that Hong Kong and Chinese imports of Swiss watches accounted for a fifth of the worldwide total in May and were worth about 40 percent more than shipments to the U.S., where a slowing economy and the dollar’s decline are weighing on Richemont’s sales growth.

Sales in the U.S. grew by 20 percent to approximately $430.1 million. However, much of that growth was lost due to the weak U.S. dollar. At actual exchange rates sales growth was 6 percent for the period.

The Asia-Pacific region, which represented 25 percent of Group sales in the quarter, reported a 21 percent increase in sales to $560.3 million.

Sales in Europe increased 17 percent to $1 billion.

Japan saw an overall sales decline of 8 percent to $242.7.

The company said first quarter sales typically represent between 20 and 25 percent of the its annual sales and may not be representative of trends for subsequent quarters or the year as a whole.

JCK