It’s almost like a theme out of a Kafka book. While the DTC Botswana proudly presents its new board of directors, which is responsible for allocating rough diamonds to local factories, two of the largest existing operations are contemplating a possible lock-out, closing ... Read More...

The Indian diamond industry is, in a strange way, enjoying a period of exceptional goodwill in the highest echelons of governance. There is a... Read More...

The DMCC has known from the very infancy of its ambitious diamond project that selling office space in the some-70-floor Almas Tower would be the easy part. However, the creation of genuine added-value products... Read More...

On October 29, 2007, the Namibia DTC (NDTC) will announce its rough allocations to local diamond manufacturers under the new distribution system. The NDTC contract period will run from October... Read More...

Checking in for a recent Heathrow-Mumbai flight, I couldn’t help noticing a female traveler wearing what looked like a rough diamond pendant. It was a huge, milky, smooth-looking stone, which must have been in the 40-50 carat range. Intuitively, I surmised... Read More...

De Beers Chairman Nicholas (“Nicky”) Oppenheimer was clearly dismayed at last week’s memo in which we quoted his son Jonathan that “South Africa’s attempts to boost a local diamond beneficiation industry would not work unless there... Read More...

“He is so sweet, this kid, that he’ll get De Beers into deep trouble.” These words accompanied an e-mail I received recently. Attached to this email was an article in which De Beers Director and heir to the diamond dynasty, Jonathan Oppenheimer, was quoted as calling the government of... Read More...

Yesterday was "D-day." Some hundred existing DTC Sightholders and another 100-or-so applicants filed their sight allocation contract proposal questionnaires to the SoC Ombudsman, Dermot Gleeson. At this point, the profiles will go through... Read More...

When the European Commission (EC) announced, in January that it was dropping all of its investigations against De Beers’ Supplier of Choice (SoC), this decision was based primarily on two other decisions: the widening of the Ombudsman’s powers and on De Beers’ commitment to stop its purchases from Alrosa after 2009. Read More...

In order to enhance the integrity of the Diamond Trading Company’s (DTC) Sightholder selection process, the DTC and De Beers have agreed to separate the responsibilities for the distribution of rough and for the marketing and... Read More...