oronto-listed Mountain Province Diamonds will next week put on sale an “exceptional” coloured rough diamond, which it recovered from the Gahcho Kué mine, in Canada’s Northwest Territories.
The diamond, a 151.60 t octahedron of exceptional clarity, will be offered for sale alongside a selection of more than 90 individual special rough diamonds recovered from the company’s Canadian diamond mine.
The upcoming sale represents the biggest offering of +10.8 ct gem quality diamonds offered by the company to date.
“This important diamond represents a clear example of the Gahcho Kué mine’s ability to consistently recover high-quality gems of exceptionally large size. These gems are highly coveted by collectors around the globe not only for their beauty but increasingly, for their Canadian origin,” commented VP for diamond marketing ReidMackie.
The second largest internally flawless fancy vivid pink diamond to ever appear at auction was unveiled Wednesday in London by Sotheby’s. The 11.15-carat Williamson Pink Star will be sold in a single-lot auction in Hong Kong on October 5. Its estimate is $21 million.
The auction house says it has the potential to set a new per carat price record for a fancy vivid pink diamond.
“We do have the confidence that it will find a great collector and have the interest of multiple parties,” Wenhao Yu, chairman of Jewellery and Watches at Sotheby’s Asia, told Forbes on Tuesday. “It has the potential to reach a very strong price.”
He adds, “This diamond truly checks all the boxes. It has the best qualities you can have in a pink diamond.”
The current price per carat auction record for a fancy vivid pink diamond is $2,656,909 for the 18.96-carat Winston Pink Legacy, sold in 2018 by Christie’s Geneva. The largest internally flawless, fancy vivid pink diamond offered at auction is the 59.60-carat CTF Pink Star. It was sold by Sotheby’s Hong Kong in 2017 for $71.2 million, a world record for any gem or jewel sold at auction.
Yu compares the Williamson Pink Star to an exceptional work of art.
“We timed this lot to be offered between Sotheby’s modern and contemporary art auctions. That’s because instead of offering just another important diamond, we view this diamond as a work of art from mother earth and a wonder of nature,” Yu says. “It’s comparable to a Monet or a Picasso and is even more rare.”
The Williamson Pink Star is the second largest internally flawless fancy vivid pink diamond
The Williamson mine is one of the oldest operating diamond mines in the world, famous for producing what is described as “bubblegum” pink diamonds, according to the auction house. One of the best-known diamonds from the mine is the 23.6-carat Williamson Pink Diamond fashioned into a brooch by Cartier and owned by Queen Elizabeth II.
“We wanted to relate the important provenance of the Williamson mine when naming the diamond,” Yu says. “The unique saturated pink color is one of the important qualities of diamonds from this mine. It is an honor for us that after so many decades another important pink diamond comes from the Williamson mine and we can offer it at auction.”
The cushion-shaped diamond was crafted from a 32.32-carat rough diamond by Diacore, a diamond manufacturer that specializes in crafting rare, exceptional fancy-colored diamonds. The company purchased the gem in late 2021 for $13.8 million. Yu says crafting the diamond is just as important as discovering it, and Diacore is one of the few companies in the world capable of cutting and polishing such an important gem.
The Williamson Pink Star is mounted in an 18k gold ring flanked by trapeze
“Not every rough can yield a diamond of this high quality so we should also give credit to Diacore,” he says. “They really made cutting and polishing into an art. They are very skilled and experienced with the best technology and a lot of courage. It’s rare to have a vivid pink color. It’s rarer when it’s over 10 carats and even more rare if it’s internally flawless. It’s luck to find this kind of diamond that was formed underground for millions of years, and it takes a great amount of art and creativity to fashion it into a gorgeous stone with so many exceptional qualities.”
Pink diamonds are among the rarest colors to occur naturally in diamonds. Of all the diamonds submitted to the Gemological Institute of America (which analyzes and grades diamonds), fewer than 3% are classified as colored diamonds, and fewer than 5% of those are considered predominantly pink.
The Argyle Mine in Australia, before it was retired in 2020 after exhausting its supply of gem-quality diamonds, produced more than 90% of the world’s pink diamonds. The absence of pink diamonds from this mine makes important pink diamonds like the one being offered even more rare, Yu says.
“Pink diamonds are still growing in demand in the market, and this now makes the Williamson Pink Star even more sought after,” he says.
The diamond is being presented in an 18k gold ring flanked by trapeze-cut diamonds and embellished with brilliant-cut diamonds.
London is the first stop where the diamond will be viewed by the public. It will then travel to Dubai, Singapore and Taipei before the final viewing and sale in Hong Kong.
Heritage Auctions has unveiled a 1.21-carat, fancy-orangey-red diamond that will go under the hammer at its Fall Fine Jewelry Signature auction on September 29.
“This gem is one of only a few diamonds to display enough saturation and intensity to be graded as a true red,” said Jill Burgum, Heritage Auctions’ executive director of fine jewelry. “Adding to the allure, the cause of a red diamond’s color remains a mystery to scientists, making this stone even more of a marvel.”
The stone has a presale estimate of $100,000 to $150,000.
Other notable diamonds included in the sale are a 17.63-carat, fancy-intense-yellow diamond ring from the estate of Dallas philanthropist Mary Anne Sammons Cree, which is expected to fetch $300,000 to $400,000. More than 125 jewels from Cree’s collection are up for sale, with the proceeds going to the Communities Foundation of Texas as well as Dallas-area nonprofits.
Apple Watches can do everything. You can use one to track your blood pressure or unlock your car. You can use it to pay when you’re shopping or even to order a pizza. But as fans of traditional mechanical watches, we have to ask – where’s the elegance? Where’s the extravagance? You can’t flex with an Apple Watch the way you can with a Rolex Daytona and there’s no smartwatch that catches the eye like James Bond’s Omega Seamaster. Well, that was until the Swedish luxury tech accessory brand Golden Concept announced its outrageous new diamond-encrusted Apple Watch case – the most expensive in the world.
Golden Concept
You read that correctly, these are the first and only Apple Watch cases decorated with real diamonds, and if you have $15,000 spare you can grab one. But be quick as there are only 7 of these spectacular cases available, each housing 443 diamonds. Based in Stockholm, Golden Concept is a world leader when it comes to crafting exclusive and ultra-high-quality cases for Apple products, but this new release had even its biggest fans doing a double take.
So what’s all the fuss about? Quite simply, it’s the diamonds. For a start, each watch case has nearly five hundred of them and they take a week to set and hand finish. And these are exceptional E colour grade diamonds – this is the second-highest colour grade, meaning they have exceptional clarity and colourlessness. They are set into a case carved from a single block of solid titanium, a metal both stronger and lighter than the stainless steel more commonly used for watch cases.
Golden Concept
The result is a stunning design and the select buyers can have a case created for an Apple Watch 7 or opt to preorder one for the upcoming Series 8. In addition, each watch can be personalized with an engraving on the case back and, in a nice touch, the Golden Concept watches also come with a customised strap fashioned from high-performance fluoroelastomer. This is a famously durable material that is also resistant to changing temperatures making it ideal for sports use.
Yes, the price of the Diamond Edition case is insane, but we’re sure that buyers are going to love the opulence regardless. These Apple watches are neither sensible nor utilitarian. Instead, they’re over the top and excessive – ideal if you like your tech to be something to flaunt.
Diamond is a naturally occurring rare mineral that is composed of pure elemental carbon. Due to the extremely rigid arrangement of the carbon atoms in a crystal structure, diamonds possess the maximum hardness and thermal productivity than any natural material. Diamonds are also in high demand as gemstones and as luxurious commodities. Despite having a reputation for being used in jewelry like rings and necklaces, 80% of mined diamonds are used for research and industrial purposes because of their toughness and shine.
The hardest substance known to man, diamonds, are frequently used to drill, grind, or cut other difficult materials. Initially, its reserves were only discovered in Africa and provided to the rest of the globe, but today, exploration and production of diamonds have also begun on other continents. Currently, Russia produces 30% of the world’s diamonds, and approximately 39.12 million carats of diamonds were produced in Russia in 2021, making it by far the greatest diamond-mining nation in the world. With a production of 22.9 and 17.6 million carats of diamonds, respectively, Botswana and Canada are placed in second and third place, followed by the Democratic Republic of the Congo and South Africa.
1. Russia (39.12 Million Carats)
Kimberlite pipe Mir. indigenous diamond deposits in Yakutia, Northern Russia.
Russia presently leads the world in diamond output after it began mining in 1947. Regarding volume, it is also the top exporter of rough diamonds worldwide. ALROSA is Russia’s largest diamond miner, maintaining a virtual monopoly over the sector and producing over 90% of the nation’s annual output. Russia houses some of the world’s greatest mines and diamond reserves (some of which have not yet been explored), including Udachny, Grib, and Aikhal. It was revealed in 2014 that Alrosa intends to expand the Udachny mine into a 5 million carat per year project, making it the most significant diamond mine in both Russia and the entire globe. Alrosa first used Udachny in 1971, and during the following 43 years, it has helped the company make over $80 billion. Alrosa should be able to keep its position as the world’s biggest diamond producer by volume for the foreseeable future due to Udachny’s figures.
2. Botswana (22.88 Million Carats)
Workers walking in top of the tailings of kimberlite at a diamond mine in Botswana.
A significant diamond mine was found in 1966, the year Botswana declared its independence from Britain, in a rural region called Orapa, about 250 miles from the nation’s capital of Gaborone. De Beers, the firm that discovered the mine, was and still is the world’s largest supplier of “rough stones.” The two most significant of the seven mines in the country are Orapa and Jwaneng. Despite ranking second in terms of volume, Botswana tops the list of the world’s top producers of diamonds. Botswana, which was one of the world’s 25 poorest nations, has achieved upper-middle income status due to the revenue from diamonds. The nation is currently vying for a more significant position in the sector as the No. 1 player Russia faces condemnation from around the world for its invasion of Ukraine.
3. Canada (17.62 Million Carats)
Aerial view of Ekati Diamond Mine in Northwest Territories, Canada. Image Credit: Jason Pineau via Wikimedia Commons
The Northwest Territories, which were once used as hunting grounds, are now used mainly for large-scale resource extraction, including diamond mining. Diamonds weren’t found by non-natives until 1991, specifically by two geologists named Chuck Fipke and Stewart Blusson. The first diamond mine in the Northwest Territories, known as Ekati, opened in 1998 because of this finding. The Arctic Canadian Diamond Company presently oversees the operation of Ekati, which is a responsible steward of the environment and a significant source of high-quality employment and money for the area. Most of Canada’s diamonds are mined in the Northwest Territories, which comprise about 40% of the total geographical area. There are currently four working diamond mines in Canada, three in the NWT – the Ekati, Diavik, and Gahcho Kué mines – and the Renard diamond mine in Quebec.
4. Democratic Republic Of The Congo (14.09 Million Carats)
The Democratic Republic of the Congo is the country that turned South Africa’s diamond industry profitable. Miniere de Bakwange (MIBA), a joint venture between the Belgian business Sibeka and the DRC government, which controls 80% of the company, is the only commercial diamond producer in the DRC. Although ongoing political unrest has caused production to fall recently, the DRC has the capacity to produce more diamonds. Only a tiny area has been examined, and mining has only ever been done on a small basis. Most of the DRC’s output is mined by the informal sector rather than mining companies. De Beers markets about one-third of Sibeka’s production and holds a 20% stake in the company.
5. South Africa (9.72 Million Carats)
Historic Kimberley Diamond mine in Kimberley, South Africa.
Almost all the modern diamond trade originates in South Africa. The earliest diamonds found in South Africa were alluvial diamonds. Diamonds were initially discovered in yellow earth in 1869, and then later below ground in hard rock called blue ground near and in what would become Kimberley in the Northern Cape, the diamond center of the world. Later, the blue rock was given the mining town’s name: kimberlite. One of the country’s biggest diamond deposits is located in the South African province of Gauteng. As the government and miners continue to find significant diamond resources and pipelines, the demand for diamonds in South Africa is anticipated to rise.
One can therefore expect the global diamond industry to keep expanding and displaying a bright future as long as economic prosperity continues to improve and as long as there are still diamond reserves that have not yet been mined.
India, which cuts or polishes about 90% of the diamonds sold in the world, is ramping up sales of laboratory-made gems as demand from the US surges and they become more accepted in other markets.
Exports of polished lab-grown diamonds may double in the current financial year started April 1 from $1.3 billion in the prior year, Vipul Shah, vice chairman of the Gem & Jewellery Export Promotion Council, said in an interview. “We have a huge potential to grow exports to $7 billion-$8 billion in the next few years on the back of US demand and acceptability in the UK and Australia,” he said.
“It is going to be treated as a fashionable jewelry, which is affordable to the youngsters, and that’s the way the market is going to shift,” Shah said.
Diamonds grown in labs represent a small portion of the market currently — India shipped nearly $24 billion of polished diamonds mined naturally last year. Still, the much cheaper variety has been growing its share as it has the same physical characteristics and chemical makeup as mined stones, with experts needing a machine to distinguish between synthesized and mined gems.
Lab-made diamonds are developed from a carbon seed placed in a microwave chamber and superheated into a glowing plasma ball. The process creates particles that crystallize into diamonds in weeks.
Exports of polished lab-grown diamonds from India jumped about 70% in the April-July period to $622.7 million, while those of cut and polished mined diamonds fell around 3% to $8.2 billion during the same period, GJEPC data showed.
One advantage of the man-made gem is that it has a tracking system that helps monitor the supply chain and maintain consumer confidence in the gems.
“Commercial gem-quality earth-mined diamonds are being replaced completely by lab-grown diamonds,” said Ritesh Shah, director at ALTR, one of the first global lab-grown brands to start business in India. The product’s affordability, low carbon-footprint, size and fine quality offer a big draw for buyers, with the US the front-runner in the shift in consumer behavior, he said.
From a handful of companies growing diamonds in labs in the mid-2000s, there are now about 25 such growers in India, he said. The country contributes about 15% of the global production of lab-grown diamonds, according to the GJEPC.
Pandora, the world’s biggest jeweller, is launching a collection using exclusively lab-made diamonds in the US and Canada as part of the company’s strategy to eliminate mined gems and create more affordable products with less associated emissions.
The Danish company, which plans to make its operations carbon neutral within three years, said the collection is the first one crafted with 100% recycled silver and gold.
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“This brings greenhouse gas emissions of the collection’s entry product – a silver ring with a 0.15 carat lab-created diamond ($300) – down to 2.7 kg CO2e, which is equal to the average emissions of a t-shirt,” Pandora said.
The flagship product, a one carat lab-created diamond set in a 14 carat solid gold ring and sold for about $1,950, has a footprint of 10.4kg CO2e, which is less than the average emissions of a pair of jeans.
The jeweller, best known for its charm bracelets, has committed to craft all its pieces from recycled silver and gold by 2025.
Pandora launched its first Pandora Brilliance collection using only man-made diamonds in the UK last year.
“Lab-created diamonds are just as beautiful as mined diamonds, but available to more people and with lower carbon emissions,” chief executive officer Alexander Lacik said in the statement.
World’s top jewellery maker Pandora ditches mined diamonds The Danish company, best known for its charm bracelets, already doesn’t include mined diamonds in most of its pieces. (Image courtesy of Pandora.) While producing diamonds is energy-intensive, Pandora said its gems would be made using only renewable energy.
Since 2011, when prices peaked thanks to China’s younger shoppers, diamonds have faltered. Lab-grown stones, initially priced confusingly close to the real thing, posed a challenge.
Top diamond makers reacted to the new kind of diamonds, widely embraced by young consumers as they look identical to mined stones, by launching a joint marketing campaign.
Under the motto “Real is Rare”, the Natural Diamond Council (formerly the Diamond Producers Association), which groups the world’s leading diamond companies, launched a series of film-like spots targeting millennials — those born between 1981 and 1996.
Failing that, they begun selling man-made diamonds themselves. Anglo American’s De Beers created the Lightbox brand to sell alternative diamonds for a fraction of the price of the mined ones.
Ethical concerns Despite the establishment of the Kimberley Process in 2003, aimed at removing conflict diamonds from the supply chain, experts say trafficking of precious rocks is still ongoing.
Miners and world famous jewellers including Tiffany & Co, have come up with innovative ways of certifying their stones as ethically mined, mostly based in blockchain technology.
In 2020, the New York-based company began providing customers with details of newly sourced, individually registered diamonds that trace a stone’s path all the way back to the mine.
Signet Jewelers has signed a deal to acquire online retailer Blue Nile for $360 million in cash.
The purchase will boost Signet’s bridal, “accessible luxury” and digital businesses, while expanding the group’s consumer base, the US retail chain said Tuesday. The company expects to complete the transaction in the third fiscal quarter, which runs until late October. Either side can pull out if the deal hasn’t closed by November 3, 2022.
“Blue Nile brings an attractive customer demographic that is younger, more affluent, and ethnically diverse, which will broaden our customer-acquisition funnel,” Signet added.
The announcement comes around two months after Blue Nile revealed plans for a stock-market flotation via a merger with Mudrick Capital Acquisition Corporation II, a special-purpose acquisition company (SPAC). The proposed deal valued Blue Nile at $873 million. Mudrick was not immediately available for comment on how that transaction progressed. The current owners are Bain Capital Private Equity and Bow Street, which acquired the e-commerce jeweler for around $500 million in 2017.
Blue Nile’s sales exceeded $500 million in 2021, according to Signet, which has stated its intention to reach total annual revenues of $9 billion in the coming years. Last October, it agreed to acquire Diamonds Direct USA for $490 million; in 2017, it bought diamond retail website James Allen for $328 million.
“By joining Signet, we will extend our premium brand and fine-jewelry offering to millions of new customers while bringing new capabilities to our leading e-commerce business that will drive additional growth opportunities for Blue Nile,” said Blue Nile CEO Sean Kell.
Meanwhile, Signet has reduced its sales guidance for the second quarter, which ended in late July, estimating revenue of $1.75 billion compared with an earlier forecast of $1.79 billion to $1.82 billion. Management cited “heightened pressure on consumers’ discretionary spending and increased macroeconomic headwinds.”
“We saw sales soften in July as our customers have been increasingly impacted by rapid inflation, so we’re revising guidance to align with these trends,” said Signet CEO Gina Drosos. The new outlook for the quarter still translates to a sales increase of around 25% compared with the equivalent period of 2019, before the Covid-19 pandemic, the executive noted.
De Beers’ revenue rose 24% in the first half of 2022, but the miner gave a more somber outlook for the rest of the year.
“We can only have strong rough sales if that’s also coupled by what’s going on on the polished side,” De Beers chief financial officer Sarah Kuijlaars told Rapaport News on Thursday. “The polished position was very strong in the beginning of the year, but it has leveled off. We have much more caution about the next six months than we’ve had for the previous six months.”
Revenue jumped to $3.6 billion in the first half as strong consumer spending during the 2021 holiday season led to intense restocking in early 2022, parent company Anglo American reported the same day. Underlying earnings gained 84% to $491 million.
Rough sales grew 27% to $3.3 billion from five sights during the period. The remaining revenue relates to other businesses such as the company’s consumer brands and industrial-diamond business.
The miner’s rough-price index, which measures like-for-like prices, rose 28% compared with the same period of 2021. The average selling price for rough surged 58% to $213 per carat, reflecting the market upturn and a shift in the product mix to higher-value goods. Sales volume fell 20% to 15.3 million carats.
The higher average price resulted from the introduction of the new Benguela Gem mining vessel off the Namibian coast, which enabled the extraction of more lucrative stones, Kuijlaars explained. In addition, production at the Venetia deposit in South Africa was focused on the final cut of the open-pit mine, which has a relatively high grade — the number of carats per tonne of ore — and high quality, the executive added.
De Beers’ results painted a complex picture of the market. Last week, the company raised its production plan for the full year in response to strong demand, predicting output of 32 million to 34 million carats. It also noted that the sanctions and boycotts targeting Russian diamonds, as well as growing interest in provenance initiatives, would “underpin” demand for its goods. The sixth sales cycle of the year, which took place earlier this month, brought in proceeds of $630 million — 23% higher than for the equivalent period a year ago.
However, inflation in the US and lockdowns in China have created concerns across the industry.
“This time last year, our operation was coming out of Covid-19 [during which output slumped],” Kuijlaars pointed out. “To stabilize our production has been really important, and that strong production gives us confidence for the full year. That’s our part in delivering reliable supply. As we sell that through, we are very alert to signs of any slowdown in the remaining four sights of the year.”
Lucapa Diamond Company has recovered one of the largest pink diamonds in history: a 170-carat stone from the Lulo mine in Angola.
The type IIa rough, named the Lulo Rose, is “believed to be the largest pink diamond recovered in the last 300 years,” Lucapa said Wednesday. It is also the fifth-largest diamond from Lulo, and the deposit’s 27th over 100 carats since commercial production began in 2015. Lucapa plans to sell the diamond through an international tender conducted by Angolan state diamond-marketing company Sodiam, it noted.
“The record-breaking Lulo diamond field has again delivered a precious and large gemstone, this time an extremely rare and beautiful pink diamond,” said José Manuel Ganga Júnior, chairman of the board of state-owned Endiama, one of Lucapa’s partners in the deposit. “It is a significant day for the Angolan diamond industry.”
In addition to the pink, Lulo is also the source of Angola’s largest diamond, a 404-carat rough named the 4th February Stone.
Lucapa has begun bulk sampling at “priority kimberlites” as it searches for the primary source of Lulo’s diamonds, managing director Stephen Wetherall added.
