Heard from a contact in Guangzhou (the mecca of Chinese watches) that one of the problems has to do with the way parts are made.
As you all (should) know the "factories" we use as reference (noob, VS, ARF, H, etc) are not the makers of all of the parts that go into their watches, some may not even manufacture any parts and just assemble them, they source parts from other (actual) factories, these last factories make parts for all kind of watches: replicas, homages and legit ones alike.
So what happened (or so my contact says) is that these big factories got raided/fined/closed, creating a shortage of vital parts for some replicas (for some reason Rolex seems to have been particularly targeted).
This explains why most factories are struggling to come up with watches, including small factories that sell the 2813/cheaper replicas, as some of these are closed as well (YZ/YT, King, etc.)
As to the reasons of the raids, that is beyond anyone to say, but my contact says "they got too serious, and government cares about copyright".
Whatever the reason (s), it does appear that the replica industry may have just passed its "golden years" as things will not be the same again, at least not in the PRC.
