Diamond Demand Liftoff Held Back by China Decline, Says Polyakov

(IDEX Online) – World Diamond Council President Andrey Polyakov believes that diamond sales growth isn’t expected to speed up soon since demand from China continues to decline.

Polished diamond sales used in jewelry globally will increase 4 percent annually until at least 2019, according to Polyakov in an interview with Bloomberg News.

His estimate is in line with Alrosa’s estimates for average annual polished sales growth in the past decade, according to the report. Polyakov is an ALROSA vice president.

“We see stable growth,” Polyakov said Wednesday in an interview in New York, where the WDC is based and where its annual general meeting took place last week.

The decrease in Chinese sales, due to the country’s anti-corruption campaign, will be offset by stable demand from the U.S., Japan, the Indian middle class and in Europe, where Chinese tourists are supporting sales growth.