News – Page 43 – The Diamond Certification Laboratory of Australia (DCLA)

Brilliant Earth Warns of Caution Among Consumers

Brilliant Earth lowered its outlook ahead of the crucial fourth quarter, noting that consumers were hesitant about making purchases.

The online-focused jeweler expects full-year sales of $436 million to $446 million, down from an earlier forecast of $450 million to $470 million, it said Thursday. Fourth-quarter revenue will be between $116 million and $126 million, compared with actual sales of $121.9 million a year earlier. The US company’s shares fell 26% Thursday following the news.

“While we’re pleased that we have continued to drive sustainable, profitable growth, as we look to finish the year, macro headwinds and the anticipated promotional environment are more difficult than earlier in the year, causing us to be more cautious about our fourth-quarter revenue outlook,” CEO Beth Gerstein said on an investor call transcribed by Seeking Alpha. “While we are still seeing strong consumer interest demonstrating the resonance of our brand, we are seeing a further lengthening of the decision-making process given the macroeconomic uncertainty as more customers take a wait-and-see approach.”

The adjustment came even as third-quarter sales rose 17% year on year to $111.4 million, reflecting the brand’s increased success among millennials and Gen Z-ers, the retailer reported. The company ratcheted up its use of TikTok after a study found that 13% of its customers learned about Brilliant Earth on that social platform; this led to a viewership increase on the site of more than 200%, management said. Group net profit jumped 44% to $5.7 million.

Source: Diamonds.net

How to Take Care Of Your Engagement Ring

Diamonds, Gemstones and precious metals can all be damaged.

Caring for your engagement ring or Jewellery will maintain the quality and beauty.

Rule of thumb is gently cleaning your ring and jewellery every so often with soapy water and light brushing. An Old tooth brush will help get into the hard to reach places.

Visit your Jeweller at least once a year for a ring health check. This should include a check of the strength of the setting and the stability of the stone.

When storing your ring, like during overseas travel, ensure the jewellery is in a secure place.

It is recommend insuring your ring for its full replacement value. If you bought at a reduced price, it may not be possible to replace at the same value in the future.

An engagement ring or heirloom may be a prized possession, with irreplaceable sentimental value. Be Certin it is protected correctly.

When visiting your Jeweller ask for the jewelry to be cleaned.

This is usually done while you wait in an ultra sound cleaner.

Avoid using chemicals or bleach when cleaning your jewelry. Some could damage gems and the finish of the item.

Never use abrasives on precious metals. The finish and integrity could be compromised and require a Jeweller to repair or polish.

All precious metals will lose the high polished shine over time. It is easy for your Jeweller to bring back the shine. Have your Jeweller check the item annually and advise on maintenance.

It is realistic to re-polish Platinum and Gold Jewellery every couple of years to maintain its smooth surface and shine.

White metal may be rhodium plated, this will wear in time and needs to be redone every few years to restore its colour and luster.

This process is inexpensive and will bring back the original look.

Store your jewellery safely.

If you’re not wearing your ring be sure you have a safe or a good lockup place for your ring or jewellery .

Remove your ring during hands-on activities.

Jewellery is easily damaged so avoid wearing the item while doing -heavy handed activities like moving furniture, gardening, lifting weights.

Depending on the type of gem, You may also want to remove your ring when you swim in chemically treated water.

Don’t remove your ring in public.

While it may be tempting to remove your ring while washing your hands, Don’t, it could slide down the drain or you might forget it altogether.

Insuring Your Engagement Ring

Have your ring valued, and have the value checked if the currency rate changes.

Make sure you insure it for its full like for like replacement.

Source: Certin

De Beers Blue Diamond Fails to Sell at Sotheby’s

A blue diamond weighing 5.53 carats failed to find a buyer at Sotheby’s Geneva on Wednesday despite being billed as the star of the auction.

The cushion brilliant-cut, fancy-vivid-blue diamond is part of an eight-piece group called the De Beers Exceptional Blue Collection, which Sotheby’s has spread between its various Magnificent Jewels sales. No bids matched the stone’s threshold price for sale, according to a post-auction report by the Fancy Color Research Foundation (FCRF). The piece carried a presale estimate of $11 million to $15 million.

“The blue is an exceptional stone in every sense,” Sotheby’s told Rapaport News Thursday. “It attracted significant interest prior to yesterday’s sale. While we didn’t get to see it sell in the room last night, we are confident it will find a new home very soon.”

Meanwhile, a number of items set records at the November 9 sale, including a 20.16-carat sapphire and diamond ring from Cartier. That piece, which fetched $2.8 million against a high estimate of $2 million, saw a record price per carat for any blue sapphire of Burmese origin ever sold at auction. A 20.58-carat, pink sapphire ring also broke the record for per-carat price, bringing in $1.9 million, or $91,690 per carat, well above its $808,368 upper price tag. A pink sapphire and diamond brooch weighing 92.01 carats by Jean Schlumberger sold for $1.8 million, outstripping its $505,278 high estimate and setting a record price for a piece of jewelry by the designer.

Another notable item at the sale was a pair of unmounted oval-cut, D-flawless diamonds weighing 20.03 and 20.19 carats. The duo fetched $4.2 million, within estimates. A step-cut, 33.13-carat, D-color, VVS1-clarity diamond ring by Cartier brought in $2.9 million, also within its expected range.

The entire Geneva Magnificent Jewels auction garnered $50 million. Sotheby’s will offer two more blue diamonds from the De Beers collection at its upcoming New York Magnificent Jewels sale on December 7.

Source: Diamonds.net

Petra Diamonds halts Williamson mine in Tanzania after dam breach

Petra Diamonds said on Monday it had halted operations at its Williamson mine in Tanzania after a tailings storage facility burst, causing flooding in nearby areas.

The company, which also operates three mines in South Africa, said the eastern wall of Williamson’s tailing dam was “breached”, but said in an email that the pit was not affected.

Petra noted that there were no injuries or fatalities confirmed so far, adding that the government and mine emergency response teams had been mobilized to the site.

“While no injuries have been reported, any impact on the local communities would be viewed as a material negative from an ESG standpoint,” Berenberg bank analysts said in a note.

The diamond miner has worked hard to clean up its image in Tanzania. Last year, it achieved a £4.3 million (about $4.9m) settlement with claimants alleging widespread human rights abuses, including beatings and detentions, at Williamson —the country’s biggest diamond mine.

Petra, which has repeatedly denied the involvement of its own employees in the incidents, admitted that “regrettable” incidents took place at the mine in the past.

The clashes between locals and police resulted in “the loss of life, injury and the mistreatment of illegal diggers” within the mining license, it said last year.

Watchdog World Mine Tailings Failures (WMTF) said Williamson’s is third diamond tailings failure in a year and the 19th of this decade (2015-2024).

The organization’s executive director, Lindsay Newland Bowker, noted that in terms of mineral production, this decade is already the worst in terms of catastrophic tailings failures in recorded history.

Source: Mining.com

Pink diamond sells for $49.9m

*The 11.15-carat Williamson Pink Star diamond*

An 11.15 carat pink diamond has been sold for $49.9m in Hong Kong, setting a world record for the highest price per carat for a diamond sold at auction.

Auctioned on Friday by Sotheby’s Hong Kong, the Williamson Pink Star diamond was originally estimated at $21m.

The gem draws its name from two legendary pink diamonds.

The first is the 23.60 carat Williamson diamond which was presented to the late British Queen Elizabeth II as a wedding gift in 1947.

The second is the 59.60 carat Pink Star diamond that sold for a record $71.2m at auction in 2017.

The Williamson Pink Star is the second largest pink diamond to appear at auction.

Pink diamonds are among the rarest and most valuable of the coloured diamonds.

Lucara Sales Fall Amid Lack of High-Value Diamonds

The Karowe diamond mine in Botswana. — *Lucara Diamonds – Karowe Diamond Mine*

Lucara Diamond Corp.’s sales dropped in the third quarter as the company supplied fewer large and expensive stones from its lucrative Karowe mine in Botswana.

Revenue fell 31% year on year to $49.9 million, while net profit slumped 86% to $1.8 million, Lucara reported Wednesday.

Sales of rough from Karowe declined 36% to $46.5 million, with volume down 15% at 99,301 carats and the average price falling 43% to $337 per carat. The remaining revenue came from sales of third-party goods on Lucara’s Clara online platform.

Management blamed a decrease in the number of high-value diamonds the company sold to HB Antwerp through the pair’s supply agreement. The Belgian manufacturer is contracted to buy all Karowe rough of 10.8 carats or more, with Lucara receiving a proportion of the final polished proceeds.

In the third quarter a year earlier, Lucara sold four pink diamonds and two white, type IIa stones — weighing 393.5 and 257.5 carats — to HB. As a result of the unfavorable comparison, revenue from the agreement plummeted 46% to $27.1 million.

“Despite the overall decrease in revenue recognized in [the third quarter], diamond-market fundamentals continued to support healthy prices as steady demand and some inventory shortages were reported,” Lucara said. Fluctuation in the availability of 10.8-carat production is expected, it added.

Output from Karowe slid 19% year on year to 78,879 carats for the quarter.

Source: diamonds.net

Contraband handbags, diamonds and vodka auctioned off by French government

France’s finance ministry is auctioning off customs contraband in an “extraordinary sale” featuring platinum bars seized en route to the UK, designer handbags, valuable historic coins, several collections of uncut diamonds and 2,016 bottles of vodka.

The 350 lots – valued collectively at about €1m – also include a Volkswagen Golf stopped at France’s border with Spain and found to contain 480kg of cannabis resin.

White gold Rolex set with 40 rubies, catalogue estimate €15,000. — *A white gold Rolex set with 40 rubies, with a catalogue estimate of €15,000.*

More than 1,200 potential buyers have signed up to take part in the auction, which will be held in the finance ministry at Bercy in Paris.

The 14 platinum bars weighing 1kg each and stamped “Crédit Suisse” were reportedly discovered by French customs officials in the baggage of two people travelling to the UK who claimed they were working for a Paris business. Each ingot is for sale at a starting price of €22,000.

*One of the 14 platinum bars up for auction.*

Seized items detailed in the catalogue also include gold sovereigns bearing the heads of the British monarchs Elizabeth II, Victoria, Edward VII and George V, as well as several gold “Napoléons”.

Among the luxury goods up for auction are Louis Vuitton, Chanel, Fendi and Valentino handbags and several expensive watches including a white gold Rolex set with 40 rubies – catalogue estimate €15,000 – as well as perfumes and a pair of Bottega Veneta shoes seized at Nice airport. The uncut diamonds, being sold in several lots – one of which is listed as totalling 197.95 carats – were seized at Paris airports.

Certain items will be sold only to professional buyers for security or legal reasons, including three and a half pallets of Grey Goose vodka bottles, listed with a starting price of €10,000.

Three and a half pallets of Grey Goose vodka bottles are listed with a starting price of €10,000. — *Three and a half pallets of Grey Goose vodka bottles are listed with a starting price of €10,000*

The finance ministry said the sale reflected “the diversity of objects seized by customs officers”.

“The customs service battles daily against all illegal traffic that threatens our territory and our society in order to protect citizens and the environment,” it added.

Source: theguardian

Debswana posts 37.5% jump in 9-month diamond sales

Rough diamonds sales by Debswana Diamond Company jumped 37.5% in the first nine months of 2022, statistics released by the Bank of Botswana showed Tuesday, driven by steady demand for jewellery.

A joint venture between Anglo American unit De Beers and Botswana government, Debswana sells 75% of its output to De Beers with the balance taken up by state-owned Okavango Diamond Company.

Debswana’s January-September sales rose to $3.578 billion from $2.602 billion a year earlier, data from the central bank showed.

In Botswana’s pula currency, Debswana’s rough diamond sales rose 52.5% to 43.237 billion pula reflecting a stronger dollar in the period.

In dollar and pula terms, the nine-month sales top the company’s full-year results in 2021 when sales totalled $3.466 billion and 38.134 billion pula.

Debswana accounts for almost all diamonds produced in Botswana with Lucara’s Karowe mine being the only other operating diamond mine in the country.

Botswana generates about 30% of its revenue and 70% of its foreign exchange earnings from diamonds.

However, De Beers sees the risk of the market slowing down in the coming months due to a deterioration in global economic conditions, reduced consumer spending and continued Chinese covid-19 lockdowns.

“In line with normal seasonal trends, we anticipate that sales in the final quarter of the year will be affected by the normal temporary closure of cutting and polishing factories for the religious holidays in India,” parent firm Anglo American said last week.

Source: mining.com

41ct. Diamond Could Fetch Up to $5M at Christie’s

Christie’s will offer a 41.36-carat Graff diamond ring at its upcoming Geneva auction, predicting it could sell for up to CHF 5 million ($5 million).

The square emerald-cut, D-color, VVS1-clarity diamond, which is potentially internally flawless, is one of the top items set to go under the hammer at the November 8 Magnificent Jewels auction, Christie’s said last week.

Several other diamonds will also take center stage, including an unmounted modified shield brilliant-cut, 101.27-carat, F-color, VVS1-clarity diamond. That stone carries a high estimate of CHF 3.5 million ($3.5 million). A pair of Art Deco modified pear brilliant-cut diamond earrings by designer Henri Picq will also be up for sale. The set, featuring one 15.39-carat, D-color, VS1-clarity diamond and one 14.85-carat, D-color, VS2-clarity stone, has an upper price tag of CHF 2.5 million ($2.5 million).

Other notable items include a cushion brilliant-cut, 20.08-carat, F-color, flawless diamond ring, estimated at up to CHF 1.5 million ($1.5 million). A pear brilliant-cut, 14.19-carat, D-color, internally flawless diamond ring has a high price of CHF 1.2 million ($1.2 million).

Those stones will join the Fortune Pink, a pear-shaped, 18.18-carat, fancy-vivid-pink diamond. The gem, which Christie’s claims is the largest of its cut and color to be offered at auction, is expected to bring in up to CHF 35 million ($35.1 million). The sale will also showcase royal jewels from the Bourbon Parma family and from the Thurn and Taxis family.

Source: Diamonds.net

De Beers Eases Buyer Terms Amid Market Slowdown

De Beers will offer widened concessions to purchasers of larger rough diamonds at its upcoming sight as trading has slowed amid difficult market conditions.

The miner will increase its “buyback” allowance to 20% for 1-carat goods and up at the sale, which begins later this month, industry insiders told Rapaport News this week.

Buybacks are a mechanism enabling sightholders to sell 10% of stones back to De Beers after making their purchases. They are popular among clients when markets are weak, as customers can handpick the least profitable items and hope the miner will offer a good price. For De Beers, they provide a way of promoting sales without reducing prices.

Lockdowns in China and global economic uncertainty have spooked sections of the industry, with De Beers’ move reflecting a split in the market. Companies that usually buy 1-carat and larger rough destined for the Far East have reduced their purchasing, while top US and European brands continue to buy melee, supporting the trade in rough under 0.75 carats, dealers explained. In that context, the miner will maintain its usual 10% buyback allowance for rough under 1 carat.

“People actually did buy a lot [of the larger items] up till June [or] July this year, when they thought China would slowly start opening up again,” a market participant said. “That clearly hasn’t happened, and there are people now sitting on those goods.”

Sightholders are expecting De Beers’ next sales cycle — its ninth of the year — to bring the miner around $400 million after buybacks, compared with $500 million in September. The sight will run from October 31 to November 4. The December sight is also likely to be relatively small as southern African cutting factories shut for the holidays.

The October sight will take place amid the Diwali season in India, for which manufacturers are expected to implement extended production pauses of up to three weeks because of the sluggish market. Many of them have been trying to slash their inventories ahead of the holiday.

“De Beers is not too eager to reduce prices at this stage. I think they want to wait till early 2023 for that,” a sightholder predicted.

Source: Diamonds.net