Alrosa Diamond Production 34.6 Mln Cts in 2011, Sales $4.5 Bln

(IDEX Online News) – Alrosa remains the world's largest diamond producer by volume. The Russian firm mined 34.6 million carats in 2011, up from 34.3 million carats in 2010, the company stated on Friday.

The Alrosa Group aggregate rough diamond sales totaled a record $4,454.8 million, an 11.4 percent year-over-year increase, according to the report posted to its website.

Net profit totaled RUB 29,519 million ($998 million), up 150.4 percent from 2010.

The company is considering a 25.2 percent dividend payment.

Alrosa's production surpasses De Beers' declining production of 31.3 million carats in 2011. However, De Beers' overall sales in 2011 had increased 26 percent to $7.4 billion and sales of rough diamonds by the DTC increased 27 percent to $6.5 billion.

De Beers' earnings increased 21 percent to $1.7 billion. One reason for the better results by De Beers is its production cut-off size. Alrosa's sift size is much smaller than De Beers, which on one hand increases the volume of production, but on the other decreases the average per carat value.