IDEX Polished Price Index: The First Increase of 2024
December 02, 24
(IDEX Online) - The IDEX Polished Price Index increased for the first time this year, as the industry showed early signs of a long-awaited recovery.
The Index rose by 0.62 per cent in November, following on from a relatively modest drop of 0.81 per cent the previous month.
The last time the Index showed positive growth was back in December 2023, when it was up by 1.21 per cent.
The increase is largely down to significant reductions in both upstream and midstream diamond production.
De Beers rolled its August and October Sights into a single event in September. It no longer publishes results of each Sight, but it is reckoned to have sold no more than $130m of rough.
Meanwhile, sanctioned Alrosa is offloading goods to the state-run Gokhran and is ready to cut production and lay off staff. India's diamond exports remain down by around a quarter year-on-year.
There are, in addition, early signs of recovering demand, particularly as the holiday shopping season approaches and the plunge in lab grown prices reinforces consumers' perception that natural diamonds hold greater value and resale potential.
The Index had been declining every month of 2024. January and February saw the smallest drops - down 0.27 per cent and 0.30 per cent respectively.
Most of the November increase took place over a couple of days, around the 21st and 22nd of the month.
The Index is finally on the increase, albeit slowly. It remains below the 100 mark (at 96.60) which means prices are still lower than when the Index was launched, in July 2004, but has ended a year-long trend of decline.
Month-to-month prices showed near zero change compared with October, when they fell by 1.3 per cent. Prices fell every month this year except for a very slight rise in January, and now the 0.62 per cent increase during November.
Year-to-year prices for November are still down, but by less than at any time in almost the last two years. They were 10.5 per cent lower than the same month last year. Ever since last October the year-to-year gap has been gradually narrowing, as seen below.
In October most of the month-to-month prices shown below were down. In November most were up. 1.0-cts goods have yet to show an increase but many other goods rose, notably 4.0-cts, which were up by 4.2 per cent.
Year-to-year prices of bread-and-butter goods for November have yet to reflect the new-found sense of cautious industry optimism. 1.0-cts were down 13.2 per cent, slightly more than 12.5 per cent the previous month. But 2.0-cts, 4.0-cts and 5.0-cts all showed positive growth.
All sizes shown below, except for 1.0-cts and 1.5-cts, remained static or increased, even if many of those increases were too modest to be visible on the graph below. The general trend had, from mid-2021 until November 2024, been downwards.
