DTC Sight – ITO’s, Price Increases and Farewells

The DTC Sight this week is, as expected, a fairly smaller one, estimated at $300 - $350 million. Most Sightholders have received their ITO’s for the first half of 2004 together with some bad news – price increases are expected.

Sightholders were told “it would be surprising if there wasn’t” a price increase in 2004. It is understood that goods under 2 carat might increase by up to 2.5 percent, while bigger goods might increase in price by 5 percent and higher, depending on the article, raising fears that some increases could reach as much as 8 percent.

Sightholders received their Intention To Offer for H1 2004, but the delivery schedule, at what Sight they receive which goods, is not known yet to all Sightholders. It seems that the smaller clients got them already while the bigger ones are still waiting to hear word from the DTC.

According to De Beers, Sightholders will get from De Beers almost exactly the goods they requested, saying the ITO’s had a 94 percent match to requests. In general DTC clients will see an increased allocation thanks to factors such as more focused and realistic applications, the decreased number of Sightholders and higher sales targets.

However in certain goods the allocations will be smaller because of factors such as limited supply, De Beers’s lower stock levels or clients scoring poorly on those items.

This was also the Sight when those who were not selected to continue as Sightholders were invited to a ‘farewell conversation’ of about 30 to 60 minutes.