Last month, I wrote in a Memo column that the economic forces that fueled the swell in recycled diamonds in the U.S. have abated, and that after a period of growth, the supply of diamonds from consumers is declining (Recycled Diamonds, Is the Party Over? February 27, 2014). The response to the column was immediate, with many asking for more figures to explain the assertion. Read More...

The sale of Zales to Sterling announced last month did not come as a surprise to many. It looks like one of the final strokes of a long-term consolidation that has occurred in the mall-based jewelry field - in all of retail, actually - since the years of near-rampant expansion in the last century. Read More...

Let’s get straight to the bottom line: at any given moment, the Gemological Institute of America (GIA) and other grading labs will have some $1.5 billion worth of diamonds in their possession that are not readily available for business. Read More...

The skeptics had a field day when De Beers and the Botswana government announced a 10-year diamond mining and sales agreement in 2011. The Diamond Trading Company (DTC) was committed to transferring many of its operations to Gaborone by the end of 2013 as part of the deal. In return, the miner received a 10-year agreement, instead of the five-year periods which had been the case previously. Read More...

Depending on where you are in the diamond value chain, recycled diamonds are either a great way to make money, or a pain to earnings and margins. Until a few years ago, recycled diamonds, (i.e. previously owned by consumers), were such a small part of diamonds in a store that they were negligible in terms of the industry’s economy. Read More...

It's a thorny issue and the arguments for both sides are well-rehearsed and sincerely expressed. Nonetheless, has the point been reached where much of the diamond industry is being damaged by diamond tenders? Read More...

A few days ago, I got an email from a freelance reporter working on a story for a very well-known and respected daily newspaper. She had a few questions about the diamond industry and mentioned as a matter of fact the “death tolls” of the diamond industry. Read More...

Is the diamond industry marketing itself successfully at the level of the organizations that represent it? To put it bluntly, are the various shows and events aimed at focusing industry attention on a specific diamond center leading to sales and creating contacts that bring about transactions? Read More...

Results from the just concluded 2013 are slowly coming in and they are providing a mixed view of the year. The big miners mined more, but prices of rough diamonds fluctuated – rising, falling and rising again. Polished diamond sales were less than stellar and their prices bucked the trend of rising on average by 3.5%-4% year-over-year. In December 2013, the average price of one carat round diamonds was nearly flat – down by 0.2% year-over-year. Read More...

The self-proclaimed Yinren Group, which is trying to purchase the Antwerp Diamond Bank (ADB) from KBC, gives curiously conflicting signals on its activities in the United States. Read More...