Gem Diamonds Raises London IPO to £9.50 per Share

African diamond miner Gem Diamonds Ltd., operator of the Letseng mine in Lesotho, has raised its initial public offering price to £9.50 per share. The company plans to offer 30 million new ordinary shares and 1.285 million existing ordinary shares on the London Stock Exchange.

Gem Diamonds plans to use the money raised from the sale to develop projects in the Central African Republic and the Democratic Republic of Congo and possibly acquire more mines.

In an interview with Bloomberg, Executive Chairman and CEO Clifford Elphick said, “Acquisition is part of our strategy and we have now have the currency to make acquisitions, we have the firepower.”

Letseng produced some exceptional stones in the recent past. A few weeks ago a 216 carat, D color, diamond was discovered at the mine. With the exception of a gletz, it was graded flawless.

In August, a 603 carat white diamond was recovered at Letseng. The diamond was sold for $12.36 million to Safdico, the manufacturing arm of Graff Jewellers.